


The Psychopathy Checklist

by orphan_account



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Child Abuse, Childhood, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Masturbation, Mental Institutions, Pre-Canon, Psychology, Pyromania, Young Matthew, psychopathy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-26
Updated: 2014-07-22
Packaged: 2018-02-06 07:16:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1849222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Matthew Brown is the textbook psychopath. A prototypical psychopath, if you will.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Glib and Superficial Charm

**Author's Note:**

> I will be using items from the PCL-R (Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised) for the purpose of this (multi-chaptered!) fic, since it's the mostly widely used and agreed upon to be effective diagnostic strategy for antisocial personality disorder that currently exists.
> 
> You can find a breakdown of it here: http://www.minddisorders.com/Flu-Inv/Hare-Psychopathy-Checklist.html#b
> 
> The wikipedia article is a reliable source as well: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare_Psychopathy_Checklist
> 
> Just a note that the events in the chapters will not be in chronological order, and will instead be revealed in the order in which the corresponding item (of which the event is relevant to) appears on the PCL-R.
> 
> wiki OUT

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matthew charms his way through a job interview for the orderly position at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

Matthew doesn't like waiting.

He doesn't like stiff chairs, sub-par lighting, or drab and unsaturated furnishings either, but certain things must be endured in order to reap future reward.

Reward being a steady salary, for example.

It's almost funny, and Matthew shifts his hand so that his grin is hidden from view, although laughter twinkles bright and bare in his eyes. Who would have pictured him sitting in a lackluster reception area atop a plastic grey chair, looking just as bland in his most formal attire, waiting for a _job interview?_  At a psychiatric hospital, no less: the fallacious Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Given Matthew's history with psychiatric hospitals, this turn of events is outright ironic.

 _Being on the other side of the bars will be fun_ , Matthew thinks, already confident that the job all but belongs to him, the deceiving decolorized white of an orderly’s uniform already slipped around his shoulders.

Matthew is sure that the interview will be very successful. He can be surprisingly charming, if not in a conventional manner, for he doesn't own outright charisma, but seduces under the guise of harmlessness and normalcy, a strategy so duplicitous that most do not notice when they fall under his guile. Unlined and juvenile facial features, slim stature, and even that goddamned lisp: they all contribute to Matthew’s innocuous façade of vulnerability.

It wasn’t always this way. Matthew’s more troublesome behaviors had once interfered greatly with his subtle deceit, but over the years, he has long since learned to keep such offensive activity buried deep, and has become so skilled at switching his charm on and off that it comes to him as easily as one might flick an electrical knob.

“Mr. Brown? Dr. Chilton is ready to see you,” states the receptionist (Secretary? Assistant?) standing in front of him.

Matthew would like to spit at her for keeping him waiting so long, but instead he smiles his most winning beam, thanks her for the trouble, and makes a supposedly-offhand comment about how good she is with colour-matching.

The receptionist seems puzzled by the out-of-the-blue compliment at first, but melts into an unconscious smile soon afterwards, attempting to hide it with her clipboard. She guides Matthew into a corridor that presumably leads to Dr. Chilton’s office.

The hallway is monotonous, as if the designer had created only a tiny section of the space and then proceeded to copy and paste the same blueprints along the entire corridor. Even the lone flickering light midway through the corridor looks like a duplicated flaw from somewhere else.

Eventually, Matthew and the receptionist reach a heavy wooden door with brass handles, this grandiose entrance looking decidedly out of place in a flat plain of grey and repetition. It is too ornate, too lavish to belong, like a monarch in gilded robes among a canaille of shabby tatterdemalions.

With one last timid look, the receptionist opens the inappropriately magnificent door, and Matthew enters a realm almost as surrealistic in its sumptuousness as the one he just exited was in its tedium.

The office is resplendent, from the diaphanous curtains adorning pellucid windows to the elaborately carved edges etched into the walls. Matthew fights off the urge to reach out and touch a corner of the textured wallpaper, to see how nobility feels. The walls are covered with important-looking papers enclosed in extravagant metallic and wooden frames. There is a large bookshelf, stretching from the plushly-carpeted floor to the high ceiling of the office, laden down with cumbersome tomes inked with fine gold script on their spines that appear as if they were specifically placed there to exaggerate their owner’s intelligence and prominence.

Said owner sits in a veritably expensive looking chair in front of the bookshelf, his elbows resting on his expansive desk, fingertips pressed together in some mockery of concentration and refinery. Dr. Frederick Chilton appears and exudes an air just as ostentatious (if not more) as his office, his posture and garb instantly indicating to Matthew everything he needs to know about the man. An avid observer of body language and physical subtleties, Dr. Chilton has already revealed his fatal weakness.

Matthew allows the corners of his lips to lift into a facsimile of a smile. This is going to be _so_ easy.

“Mr. Brown. A pleasure to meet you.” The psychiatrist stands up and extends a hand toward Matthew. His tone is stiff and overly formal, forcibly strict, overdoing the authoritativeness a little.

Matthew’s smirk is quickly replaced by a subservient smile, as he takes Dr. Chilton’s hand, shakes it twice before letting go, and says, “The pleasure is mine, Dr. Chilton.” The shift in Matthew’s attitude, the quick lathering of a new personality, goes unnoticed by Dr. Chilton, but the psychiatrist’s ego swells anyway, unconsciously.

“Please, have a seat, Mr. Brown,” Dr. Chilton says, waving a hand at the distinctly simpler chair in front of the walnut desk.

“Thank you, sir.” Matthew sits, attentively keeping his back straight and his hands folded in his lap.

“I presume that you’re applying for a position as an orderly here?”

 _What the hell do you think, you fucking overdressed prick?_ “Yes, sir.”

“And you have experience working in mental institutions?”

 _Something like that._ “Yes, I was a nurse in the psychiatric ward. The patients weren’t criminals, mind you, but we did have some volatile and potentially dangerous ones. Didn’t feel quite safe there, that’s why I quit. The place wasn’t nearly as secure or well-run as here.”

Matthew can almost _see_ Dr. Chilton’s ego inflate a little more, as if it is a penumbra floating minaciously beside his head. The thought of a phantasmal puffer fish floating by the other man’s head is amusing, and surprisingly easy to picture.

Dr. Chilton’s eyebrows rise slightly. Perhaps he means the gesture to be questioning, but instead, it just shows his obvious delight at the shaded encomium. “Well, you just answered what was _going_ to be my next question.” Dr. Chilton chuckles a little at this, and Matthew decides that it would be wise to share in his light mirth.

“Criminal instability has always been more fascinating to me, anyway,” Matthew comments with a shrug, “Your patients are quite often in the limelight, Dr. Chilton. ”

“Yes. Yes they are.” The hospital administrator adjusts his tie pompously, clearly pleased that his work has been heard of. Matthew imagines him as a preening cockatoo, ruffling his showy feathers so that their glossy sheen is clearly visible in the luminous glow of his own self-satisfaction.

“They call you a ‘collector of sociopaths’, is that true?” Matthew utters in a conspiratorial tone, leaning forward and cocking his head to one side in mock curiosity. He purposefully uses the incorrect term as a sort of competency test for the psychiatrist, to see if he picks up on Matthew’s improper vocabulary.

Dr. Chilton disappoints Matthew by not correcting the younger man, and merely stroking his own ego instead. “That is one way to put it, although I like to think of myself as a _scholar_ of sociopaths. I observe, study and analyze a wide number of them- and I do have a surprising amount of these individuals under my care, as rare as they are to catch alive- because it is my duty to do so. Once we know and understand, we no longer need to be afraid.”

During the pause that ensues, Matthew hopes that the expression on his face can be read as enraptured and not contemptuous. His generous estimate of Dr. Chilton’s arrogance was apparently not generous enough.

Dr. Chilton seems to notice that he has strayed far from the path of a job interview, and clears his throat a little anxiously. “But enough talk about criminals; I wouldn’t want to scare you off the job, eh?” He gives Matthew a nervous smile, and his eyes twitch around the room as if searching for someone listening in on this deviation from the script.

Matthew gifts the psychiatrist with a reassuring smile in return. “You shouldn’t worry, sir, I’m quite intent on getting this job.”

“Are you now? And why exactly do you think you deserve it?”

“I’m glad you asked.” _Because this interview is a goddamn pain, and as much as I like ass, kissing yours makes me wanna throw up._ “I really give my all into everything I do. I’m capable, efficient, and I won’t get cowed too easily by the patients. I do my job, Dr. Chilton, whatever that may end up to be.”

The answer seems to please Dr. Chilton, and he twirls a black fountain pen in one hand as he listens to your answer. Matthew notices the hint of a curl in the corner of the other man’s lip. _Please don’t make me suck your dick later,_ Matthew thinks, _I’m not sure how far I’m willing to commit to this fucking clown act._

“There is a risk that comes with taking this job, you know. Are you equipped to handle that?” Dr. Chilton asks, leaning onto his desk with one elbow.

“You’ll find that I’m equipped to handle a great many things that you would not expect, sir.”

“I’m sure you are,” Dr. Chilton mutters, looking Matthew up and down, unimpressed by his slight build, “But do not dive into this business lightly, Mr. Brown. Psychiatry is tricky, treacherous even, and although we call our inmates ‘patients’, it would not do to forget their true natures. This hospital contains people who have done the inhumane, the unthinkable, who have committed crimes that you could not even dream of in your worst nightmares.”

_If only you knew._

Dr. Chilton continues. “The way you treat these people will be _crucial_. Tell me, Mr. Brown, how would you treat my collection?”

Matthew’s face turns somber, and his jaw is set at a rigid angle. “I would treat them as exactly as their crimes deserve.”

This arouses the psychiatrist’s interest, and he leans forward even more, so that his tie hangs off his chest and trails atop a few scattered papers on the desk. “What do you mean by that?” he inquires in a lower voice.

Matthew tilts his chin up and looks directly at Dr. Chilton, turning his gaze simultaneously strict and magnetic. “It is in my belief, sir,” Matthew intones hypnotically in an equally low voice, every syllable careful and deliberate, “That once someone commits and inhumane crime, they cease to become human. I believe that these individuals deserve _just_ treatment. Not cruelty, not benevolence, but _righteousness.”_

Dr. Chilton is hanging onto Matthew’s every word.

“For throwing away their humanity, I think your collection deserves just treatment, as per their crimes and their rights, even if such treatment may be considered-“ he pauses, “…Unorthodox.”

Matthew leans back in his chair and smiles slowly. This time, he allows the slightest hint of cold and predation through the grin, the true being just barely shielded behind a papier-mâché mask.

Dr. Chilton settles into his own chair again, and remains silent for a moment. “That is exactly the attitude we need in institutions for the criminally insane,” he says in a quiet, admiring way, “Thank you for your time, Mr. Brown. I think I’ve heard enough.”

“You’re the expert, sir.”

Dr. Chilton stands up and holds out his right hand stiffly. Matthew mirrors his actions, and shakes, revealing a flash of teeth behind his lips. Dr. Chilton returns the smile, and it appears genuine, unlike his other staged, pretentious ones, a true expression of happiness.

“If you’re fortunate, you will hear back from me in a few days,” Dr. Chilton informs Matthew. The psychiatrist remains formal and professional, but the split-second linger in his gaze and the gentle squeeze in his handshake is just enough to tell Matthew that he has succeeded. “It has been a joy to make your acquaintance.”

“Thank you, Dr. Chilton, the same goes for you. I sincerely hope that this will not be our last meeting,” Matthew declares, putting on the same painted, winning smile that he gave the receptionist. He turns to leave the office, padding across the expensive carpet with a slight bounce in his step, and reaches for the door handle.

“Wait, Matthew-“

Matthew turns around, a panic and surprise at the psychiatrist’s sudden informality rising up in him before he regains his composure. His hand still grips the office door’s ornate handle. “Yes, Dr. Chilton? Is there anything else?”

Dr. Chilton frowns, confused, and for a second, Matthew is worried that the jig is up, Chilton is onto him, and he has five seconds to run. Luckily, this is not the case.

“Why do you speak like that? Are you from… somewhere else?”

Colour returns to Matthew’s knuckles as he loosens his hold on the door handle’s cold metal. “No, sir, I was born with a speech impediment.”

“Ah, I see,” Dr. Chilton nods understandingly, as if he had known all along but was just waiting for Matthew to confirm it himself, “It’s endearing.”

Matthew is momentarily taken aback. _Endearing?_  “Thank you,” he replies quietly, opening the door and slipping through it like an apparition, “Have a good day, Dr. Chilton.” He closes the door behind him.

When he is out of earshot and alone in the hallway, Matthew covers his mouth with his hand and allows himself a stifled giggle. It was so _easy_ ; it almost felt real at some points. He was amazed by how far Dr. Chilton had fallen for the act. Perhaps Matthew had even accidentally needled Dr. Chilton into falling for  _him_. It was unendingly hilarious.

Everything had gone exactly according to plan (at least until the tiny blip at the end, but that was inconsequential), and as painful as it was to have to act obsequiously to the mediocre psychiatrist, the ease of the task put Matthew in a good mood. It wasn’t hard to say exactly what Dr. Chilton wanted to hear- he was a simple man, and tales of his unconventional conduct regarding hospital patients wasn’t really a secret. Matthew wouldn’t have to go through the tedious process of expunging his less-than-favorable records after all; he had charmed Dr. Chilton so thoroughly that he seriously doubted the hospital administrator would even bother to run a half-assed background check.

Matthew emerges from the hallway (he has come to think of it as Purgatory in tunnel form) and is greeted by the same receptionist who brought him to Dr. Chilton’s office. She offers him a shy smile and asks, “How did it go?”

Matthew bares his teeth. “It went _perfectly_.”


	2. Grandiose Estimation of Self

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matthew is convinced that he can do just about anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bring the NARCISSISMMMM
> 
> matt was prolly a really bratty kid
> 
> btw use of the name "barney" is just a nod to matthew's more mild-mannered novel counterpart, this isn't an au where the two of them coexist although that would be pretty cool too
> 
> tw for use of ableist slurs and talkin about blood n stuff

"Betcha can't do it."

"Bectcha I can."

Two boys, both around twelve years old, stand in front of a towering chain link fence, topped with tendrils of barbed wire corkscrewing horizontally, a bit like coiled frosting on a wedding cake. Unlike many other fences they have encountered, this one is the colour of shiny quicksilver, neither dull not afflicted by chewing rust, as if each twisted piece of wire has been recently polished and maintained. After every ten feet of fence, a metal pole stands rooted to the ground, holding up the structure so that it stands like a military official instead of hunching over like a wino. About two feet above the boys’ heads, a sign is attached to the fence. It is a rectangular sign, as most signs are, but this warning seems almost aggressively quadrilateral, its parallel edges razor sharp and its four vertices strict and unforgiving. On the sign, the words “FEDERAL PROPERTY, DO NOT TRESSPASS” are printed in bold, war paint black letters against the chrome yellow of the sign. Like the fence it hangs on, the sign is well burnished, perhaps in a symbol of power and competence, or perhaps an indication of the property owner’s obsession with polishing metal until it gleams like the incandescent light of stars.

Matthew thinks that the structure in front of him is more like an unbreakable barricade with diamond-shaped holes through its length rather than a wire fence.

“This thing’s impossible to get over. Just give up, Matt.”

 _Unbreakable, but not unmanageable to scale,_ Matthew thinks, tilting his head back to appreciate the enormity of the fence.

“You’ll get in trouble, anyway.”

Matthew reaches out a hand and strokes the closest metal links, sizing them up. _I’m not even supposed to be out of the house right now- I don’t think trouble really matters._

“C’mon, this is stupid, let’s do something else.”

This incites a flare of anger in Matthew, and he turns on the other boy, his gaze so intense and his teeth clenched in such a terrifying manner, that his companion shrinks back, intimidated, despite his advantage in size.

“This was _your_ idea, Barn,” Matthew spits, “I’m not backing out of this so you can call me a coward.”

“Fine. Go and break your neck,” Barney mutters darkly, kicking a pebble so that it flies through one of the gaps in the fence, “Maybe the fall will knock your tongue in place so you’ll stop lisping all the time.”

“Maybe I _like_ thpeaking like thith, _jutht_ tho I can annoy the thit out of you,” Matthew replies mockingly, putting on a fake lisp and sticking out his tongue at Barney. He turns away from the other boy, and pours all his attention into the fence, squinting slightly, considering his strategy to success.

Matthew knows that he can climb the fence. He’s done plenty of fence hopping in his short twelve years of life, and this fence looks just as easy, if not even simpler to scale. The structure is sturdy enough so that it won’t crumple with his weight, and it has perfectly-sized holds for him to grip onto while climbing. Granted, this fence is a lot taller than the ones he has most experience with, and the barbed wire will pose a bit of trouble, but Matthew has deep faith in his abilities.

He’s _Matthew Brown_ , after all! Nothing, especially not this stupid little fence, can stand in his way. The challenge will be an interesting test of Matthew’s skills, but in the end, it will only become a _testament_ (Matthew silently congratulates himself on the apt wordplay) to his extraordinary capability.

Matthew leans in close to the fence, listening raptly for the low hum of electricity sparking through metal, but he hears none, only the sound of distant tires crushing gravel and chain links rattling slightly in the wind. He grins, and takes another step towards the fence, until his toes line up with the ends of metal wires brushing sparse grass.

Then, Matthew begins his ascent.

He starts by hooking his left hand into a hold above his head, and then his right hand into the fence somewhere around shoulder height. Next are Matthew’s feet, and in a matter of seconds, he is clinging to the fence, his entire body about a foot off of the ground. Barney gulps audibly and looks around in a nervous manner.

Unyielding wire bites into the crooks of Matthew’s fingers like stiff twine, and he is sure that the metal will leave telltale red marks later, if anyone bothered to check the digits of an adolescent for troublemaking. The fence shifts a little under his weight, but not enough to throw Matthew off, and he reaches above with his right hand and pulls the rest of his body up. The pattern repeats itself, switching from each hemisphere of his form, until Matthew’s face is level with the exhortatory sign.

This close, Matthew can see that the metal plate gleams iridescently, tiny hexagonal scales creating a rainbow ripple across its uniform surface of saffron, the bright yellow threatening him away like some poisonous amphibian whose vibrant skin cautions predators. However, this predator does not heed the warning, and smirks at it instead, laughing gleefully as he wonders if he should return to the site later with spray paint and some choice designs.

Matthew feels somehow rejuvenated at his rejection of the federal notice, and a ball-like something begins swelling at the pit of his chest. He climbs past the warning sign (giving it a good kick on his way up) and delights in the fact that he is now above everyone, literally and figuratively. Matthew feels as if staying grounded has cheated him out of his true potential, and he envisions himself not climbing over a border of one realm to the next, but out of a cage instead.

Exhilaration pumps through Matthew like gasoline at a truck-stop station, and he looks down to find that neglected grass and loose pebbles are far, far beneath him, as well as Barney and the mundane safety of horizontal movement. Matthew sucks in a lungful of oxygen through his teeth, still clenched together in a grin, relishing in how much taller the fence is while he grips onto it than it looked from the ground. If he lets go now, the drop from air to dirt will surely cause injury. The thought stuns Matthew for a second, but his shock quickly passes to be replaced by self-assurance. _It won’t, because I’m not going to let go,_ he thinks, blindly storing complete and utter faith in himself.

“Matt!” Barney calls from far below. His voice only reaches Matthew distantly. He can _swear_ that he feels his heartbeat thudding through his entire body, and it’s somewhat difficult to hear external sounds through the pleasing throb in his head and the singing of that strange swell in his chest.

“Get down from there, Matt, I’m serious, okay? That’s enough, you’re going to get hurt!” Barney’s voice floats up towards Matthew as if through an ethereal haze. Although he can see his companion’s mouth move to form words, and his hands cup around his mouth to amplify sound, Matthew is too drunk on his own invincibility to listen.

He continues skywards mechanically, left-right, left-right, until his fingertips brush something sharp and Matthew sees a globule of blood fall and shatter upon a silver wire in front of his face. Matthew brings his hand back down to eye level, and he is shocked to see that the barbs at the top of the chain link fence has pricked his fingers and left him with a scarlet reminder of his mortality.

Matthew ignores it. He brings himself up so that he is face to face with the coiled barbed wire, and wonders how to proceed. He places his thumb on top of a nearby barb, slowly applying pressure until pain and blood seeps from the digit. The barbs are quite obviously, sharp enough to cut through flesh easily, and there is no shortage of them running on the length of wire.

Matthew takes his bottom lip between his teeth, eventually deciding to brave the sharp bits of metal; he is sure that he can make it across without too much trouble. He places his hands over the top of the fence and grunts slightly as he hefts himself up so that his hips are level with the barbed wire. Gingerly, he pinches a barb-free section of the wire and holds it down so that it lays flat against the fence. Keeping one hand clenched around the wire so it doesn’t prod him, Matthew swings his left leg over the top of the fence. He stays there for a moment, straddling the boundary between freedom and incarceration, and he isn’t sure which side is which anymore. He faces the setting sun and exhales, enjoying the thrill of his newfound power, having tamed the fence and broken free of prosaicness. The _thing_ in Matthew’s chest begins playing a new song on the key of triumph, plucking at proud strings and superior chords. Slowly, its melody becomes more cacophonic, an orchestra of musicians all reading from different sheets. So discordant is the sound, that it almost sounds like-

This is when everything goes haywire.

Sirens. How raucously they sing! Their true nature once embedded beneath bedrock beauty, now rears its foul head, and the hideous sight of dully uniformed officers running towards the chain link fence is made apparent now that that the fog has lifted.

Matthew swears loudly. He is on his toes again, limbs struck with life once more, as he struggles to escape the barbed wire snarls that he has gotten himself into. Somewhere far away, Barney pleads him to run away, and a bullhorn orders him to stay in place. In his haste, Matthew rips open one of his knees getting back on the incarceration side of the fence, his face brushes against some barbs, and as he jumps down, his hand catches on a sharp bit of wire that slashes the flesh apart, leaving a sinister, bloody smile in place of his smooth, innocent palm. Matthew barely notices. He hits the ground running, dust parting in clouds before his feet, his only focus on getting away. Vaguely, he is aware of Barney sprinting a footstep behind him, and a few officers not much further. Matthew listens to their torn breaths and ragged lungs and laughs, running like the devil is on his tail.

Gradually, healthy shrubs begin cropping up every now and then, and the buildings they pass seem to pick themselves up, brushing off the dust and holding themselves a little straighter. The sound of rapid footsteps peters out, replaced by the languid ones of pedestrians walking dogs and pushing infants, wondering why these two boys are running quite so fast. Drivers roll down their windows and chatter with one another at red lights, and other adolescents loiter in the park trying to hide their cheap cigarettes as they neglect their younger siblings, but Matthew doesn’t stop running until the comfortable and unthreatening neighborhoods fade out again to give way to a visibly more decrepit area of the city, whose houses droop and whose people duck into crumbling cinderblock alleyways when he comes in sight.

Matthew stops in front of a squat apartment building, the windows on the first floor broken, and the once reddish-brown paint job stained with smoke. Barney catches up with him after about 20 seconds, his state of sweat and unrest in stark contrast to Matthew’s unruffled nonchalance.

“Took you awhile,” crows Matthew, kicking around bits of rubble and broken asphalt on the empty street, “Face it, I’m better than you.”

“This isn’t… the time… for bragging!” Barney pants, his face flushed with exertion and anger, “You almost... got us arrested!”

“ _Almost_ \- we got away in the end. Besides, I dunno about you, but _I_ wouldn’t have got caught. I’m slippery, it’s hard to catch me. Isn’t it, Barn?” Matthew smiles sweetly, bending down so that he is level with Barney’s doubled over figure.

Barney remains silent, apparently too exhausted and furious to reply. Matthew sighs and paces circles around a crooked signpost sticking out of concrete like the end of a snapped bone.

Matthew’s blood does not pound, rush or boil from his close escape and brush with authority. Instead, it flows through his body in a mostly typical manner, just tinged with a flicker of indignation. It really is such a shame that he didn’t make it all the way over. _If those damn guards hadn’t noticed…_ Matthew blames the siren’s song for his folly, but fails to realize that the siren had been born from his own dark heart. He doesn’t see that the true cause of his eventual failure was not coincidence, but hubris. He thinks that he _deserves_ to be arrogant.

“I would’ve gotten over, y’know, if they hadn’t caught me,” Matthew pouts ruefully, curling his fingers into a fist, “I’ll make it next time, I know I can do it, I was great, you saw me-”

“There’s not going to be a next time, you _retard!_ ”

Matthew stiffens, his spine straightening his lips popping apart in astonishment. It’s not the first time he’s heard the term used towards him, but it still surprises Matthew every time he hears it. He knows acutely just how smart he is, that he is definitely far more intelligent than most people in his life. It still puzzles him that others do not see his gift, but this confusion is quickly replaced with a sudden spike of the indignation level in his veins, and Matthew raises his still-clenched fist and tightens it so that more blood seeps from the wound cut deep into his palm and onto the cracked pavement.

Barney seems to realize his mistake, tripping over the curb as he takes a step back, his hands preoccupied with waving defensively in front of his chest. “Fuck, I’m sorry, Matt, I didn’t mean that, you know I didn’t! It just slipped out, I-”

“Whatever,” mutters Matthew, lowering his fist but tilting his chin up so that he manages to look down at Barney, despite the other boy being a good few inches taller. The two of them stare at each other silently for a minute, the creature living in the pit of Matthew’s chest stubbornly refusing to fully forgive Barney, and Barney hesitant to tread on another landmine. Eventually, Barney breaks down and shatters the silence, coughing and changing the subject to Matthew’s various injuries from his duel with the fence.

“You’re in deep shit,” Barney shakes his head, pointing at the blood on Matthew’s hands, knee and face, “Your fosters are gonna kill you.”

Matthew just lets loose a peal of sunny, childish laughter in response, and Barney is so taken aback that he visibly flinches. Matthew waves his hand, dismissing the topic and scattering droplets of his blood over decaying and forgotten grass.

They can’t hurt him. No one can.


	3. Need for Stimulation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are the people that put out fires, and the people that set them in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the title is so weirdly sexual and i apologize but that is exactly what it says on the PCL-R and i can't stop laughing
> 
> plenty of time for smut later, shhh

There are 42 linoleum floor tiles, 2 fluorescent light bars, 16 panels of dry wall and 20 iron bars in Matthew’s cell. There are also 5 cameras and 3 guards prowling in C Wing, but the cameras’ sightlines fall just short of Matthew’s cell, and all of the guards have stationed themselves on the other side of the hallway, talking in low murmurs. Matthew has his own personal security camera trained on him at all times inside of his cell, of course, but Matthew has figured out it’s blind spot: the inside corner of the cell opposite of his uncomfortable cot.

The selfsame uncomfortable cot that he sits on now, restlessly kicking his feet and gripping its edge with his hands. The cell is almost brutally bare, each furnishing a mere skeletal necessity, courtesy of budget cuts and Matthew’s bad behavior. He feels himself growing drowsy just looking at the blank wall, curiously free of dents, scratches, pockmarks or other blemishes that might pose momentary curiosity.

Getting arrested for second-degree arson is the most boring thing that has ever happened to Matthew.

He had initially thought that prison would be exciting, a new environment to eventually destroy. Perhaps prisons are like that, but mental institutions certainly aren’t. It is possible that the tedious atmosphere is purposefully put in place so as to not provoke the patients.

When he first arrived at the institution, Matthew had been evaluated over and over again by several different psychiatrists, all trying to pick him apart like a jigsaw puzzle stuck to cardboard with glue, desperate to know what made him tick. They often sat right outside of Matthew’s cell to make inquiries (about his childhood, his relationships, his hopes and passions), and then they would diagnose his answers just as a medieval doctor would gauge the sickness of a plague victim. Matthew often answered untruthfully, replying to questions with queries, finding it more amusing to construct himself in a manner that the psychiatrists wanted to hear, rather than letting them see a labyrinth that they could not traverse, no matter how much scientific twine and analytical silk they brought with them. _Schizoid? Schizotypal? Borderline?_ They studied and interviewed and guessed, but in the end, they simply could not understand. Matthew liked it better that way.

Once, a particularly jittery psychiatrist had carelessly left behind a single sheet of notes during a session with Matthew. He had seen the tarnished paper flutter to the floor like a dying moth, and snatched it up before the guard on duty could see. Stuffing the thin sheet under his jumpsuit (60% polyester, machine washable, ashen gray with a hint of green), Matthew had later squished himself into the security camera’s blind spot and unfolded it. The psychiatrist’s notes were a rambling, scrawled mess, but what Matthew could make out of it was amusing enough.

 _Desire for solitariness._ Matthew has always wanted a partner to hunt with. _ASD? Difficulty with emotions._ Not really. _May experience some degree of guilt or remorse from actions._ Given the chance to do everything all over again, he’d use more gasoline. _Pyromaniac- Delinquent fire setter?_ Matthew had almost laughed at that one. Pyromania was already a given, seeing the circumstances of his arrest, and despite the psychiatrist’s focus on his medical record and fire-related history, he hadn’t even considered the possibility of Matthew being a pathological fire setter, the closest arsonist type that he could be identified as.

For six months, Matthew has eschewed obedience and routine. Now that he no longer has to blend in or mute himself as to not attract attention, he tries to stir up a ruckus whenever he can, giving slothful monotony a sharp prod. Matthew is always careful that whatever trouble he makes is not major enough to earn him severe punishment, but he can make do without his dental floss. Besides, Matthew fancies himself something of an escapologist: very good at getting away.

Matthew leans away from the cot to peer through his cell bars one more time before getting up (careful to make sure that the cuff of his right pant leg remains rolled up) and casually strolling out of the security camera’s line of sight. He sits down carefully in the camera’s blind spot, making sure that every last limb and edge of clothing stays inside his shrouded corner.

Still keeping an eye on the hallway, Matthew unrolls the bottom of his pant leg and removes a small, sharp piece of rock from its cuff, and tattered bits of shredded paper that used to be a pococurante psychiatrist’s notes. From within the sleeve of his jumpsuit, Matthew extracts an undershirt (missing from the institution’s lineup of identical attire) torn into scraps of fabric. He unbuttons the front of his jumpsuit so that it hangs loose off of his torso, billowy and unsupported, like a wasted balloon. Matthew grips the cloth between his hands, brings it up to his mouth, and places his teeth around the topmost button. He tears it off of the jumpsuit with a quick jerk of his head, feeling pleased with the way the thread that held the button in place snaps to free the chunk of metal. He sets the strands of liberated fiber alongside the paper and torn undershirt.

Matthew surveys his assortment of desultory items, calculating and running through a plan in his head. As much as he enjoys challenges, this particular situation makes him careful. Not tentative or anxious. Just careful.

Although he is sure that he would look like a dork, Matthew wishes that he wore glasses. It would make this so much easier.

He takes the rock in his left hand, turning it over and over between his fingers. The stone is about the size of Matthew’s thumb up to his first knuckle, with an uneven surface that causes uncomfortable friction as he rubs it against his skin. Matthew couldn’t believe his luck when he saw the rock lying just within arm’s reach of his prison cell, 5 days ago. It must have been stuck in the treads of one of the guards’ boots and gotten loose when they walked past Matthew’s cell. Because of this auspicious coincidence, an unwitting guard has just become accomplice to Matthew’s plan, a smuggler of accidents and chance.

Matthew picks up the button in his right hand, holding it up to the buzz of dim fluorescent lighting, admiring its dull, unpolished surface. The button’s involvement had not been contingent, but a sudden bright idea.

Laundry day was 3 days ago. Matthew had stuffed his undershirt beneath the cot, along with the thankfully saved sheet of notes. When the orderly collecting dirty jumpsuits and doling out new ones passed by with his laundry cart, Matthew leaned against the bars, wedged his face between two, and cleared his throat loudly.

“Get away from the bars, inmate,” the nurse had ordered in a gruff voice.

Matthew stepped back compliantly with a sweet smile, and handed his laundry through the bars, accepting his fresh jumpsuit. “What are the buttons made of?” he asked, keeping his voice pleasant and light, purposefully adding a whimsical lilt to his voice. He already had a great deal of success in playing off an innocent and childish persona to the hospital staff, but it didn’t hurt to reinforce the impression.

The orderly had seemed confused. “Why d’you wanna know?”

“Just curious. I like to know things,” Matthew said airily.

The orderly squinted at Matthew, then shrugged, deciding that there was no possible way for the question to be a trick. To him, there was no way that this could end in Matthew's advantage, judging by which side of the bars they both stood. “Steel,” the orderly had answered, moving on without another word. He hadn’t even noticed a missing undershirt from the laundry.

Although thinking to use the button is Matthew’s own innovation, he has to admit that fortune grins wildly upon him. What are the chances that this particular mental institution uses uniforms with steel buttons? And what are the even odder odds that a guard may walk by and deposit a stone from their boot, right in front of Matthew’s cell, and not just any adventitious rock, but a shard of flint? Fortune must be doubled over in a fit of laughter by now.

Matthew strikes.

He brings together both hands sharply and scratches the button with one edge of the rock. Nothing. He frowns. This procedure must be performed with deadly surgical precision, given the size of his tools and his circumstances. It’s possible that the orderly had lied or made up the button’s source material, or he had misidentified the rock, but Matthew doesn’t think so. He thinks that he should try again.

The next time, Matthew sees a flicker of effulgence between flint and steel. He pulls his little pile of tinder closer and aims his next strike so that any stray sparks will fall on the pile. The clack of button and stone clashing against one another sounds like glorious firecrackers to Matthew, all spice and flamboyance, too proud to hide. Luckily, the sound isn’t actually loud enough to draw attention or wake slumbering inmates.

Like a video clip on repeat, Matthew recapitulates his movements over and over again, until his fingers turn numb from repetitive bashing, slowly speeding up so that sparks blossom instantaneously before the last batch has time to wither. Lovely gold and titian petals fly from Matthew’s hands, like he is God creating a miniature firework show, no, a meteor shower, burning brightly great ethereal distances away, raining beauty across blinded retinas and primal minds.

 _It’s funny,_ Matthew thinks, _how this creation is only born to destroy._

A glow! Sparks scatter on scraps of flimsy paper, and a small edge of crimson and xanthous eats its way up unadorned white material like a ravenous, mercurial coast line. With the intense composure of a sniper just before shooting, Matthew leans down closer to the already dissolving premature ember, purses his lips together, and blows on it gently, as if scattering dandelion seeds to the summer breeze. Instantly, the bright edge of potential grows brighter, lackadaisical yellow-orange becoming ablaze with gold. A small tongue of flame flickers into being delicately, and Matthew almost extinguishes it with another breath of excitement.

Quickly, Matthew piles more paper near his infant conflagration, close enough so that its suckling mouth can feed easily, but not so overbearing that the fuel smothers his beneficiary. Almost cheerfully, a small fire builds, so diminutive that he could scoop it up in between his two palms and cradle it like a child. Matthew bathes in this aura of warmth, light and glowing hope in the corner of his lifeless cell. Transfixed, he continues to add tinder to the crackling fire, delighting in his own resourcefulness and the way his flame is now releasing spidery spirals of black smoke and how its heat now encircles his face.

With the last piece of paper devoured by the fire, Matthew decides that it’s time. Careful not to suffocate his fragile creation, he slips a large scrap of torn fabric under and around the fire. He slowly holds the fire aloft so that it is suspended in mid-air, attached to scorched cloth like a parasite, its exquisite flames tasting his fingers zealously, hungry to discern whether human flesh can also be consumed.

There is enough smoke coming off of the ball of charred remains and vigorous fire to selfishly push aside the breath in Matthew’s lungs, and hopefully to obscure a clear image on the security cameras. He brings his left arm back, steps forward with his right foot, and with the expertise of an adolescent tried and legally considered an adult who spent too much time pitching rocks at passing birds or in grungy basements playing darts before getting arrested, he throws the flaming wad in a gap between his wide-set cell bars and into the middle of the institution hallway.

After that, Matthew sits in the epicenter of his cell, cross-legged and thoughtful, blowing on his reddened fingertips. He watches his creation blaze in a detached manner, waiting for hell to break. Not to break loose, but to _break_.

Matthew doesn’t want to see exodus. He wants to see bedlam.

And bedlam he receives.

First, Matthew hears voices, rising in protest at the sudden, sharp scent of open flame. Then, footsteps come pounding down the hall, so urgent that Matthew can feel panic through the vibrations in the floor. Next, he hears fire alarms, brazen and thundering in animate warning, but to Matthew, they sound like the tolling of church bells announcing the holy rest of a corpse. Matthew appreciates the speed of his entertainment, admiring the mental institution’s apt smoke detectors, blaring out caution as soon as a single coil of fumes tickles the ceiling. It is quite satisfying to harvest the fruits of his labour so soon after sowing.

Matthew's cell door clicks. The sound is too soft to be heard over the shouting, running, and blaring, but he knows that each patient’s cell door is set to automatically unlock in case of a fire. He wonders if his fellow inmates have noticed this and made a break for it, but the air is too thick with vaporous grey to tell for certain whether the smoke-blurred outlines in the hallway that he sees are the liberated sheep or the shepherds. Matthew himself stays comfortably within his cell, knowing that an escape attempt would be fruitless. The exit doors from the wing and the general building remain locked, emergency or not.

Besides, with the size of his awe striking fire, he isn’t sure if the heat-gathering metal bars of his cell are safe to touch.

A bitter, chemical smell permeates Matthew’s scent glands, most likely the release of toxins from unfortunately flammable outdated linoleum into the air. If only mental institutions invested properly in building renovation, they wouldn’t have this problem on their hands. Due to indolence and apathy, the hospital has created a clean, unbothered road for flame to run through, a maze’s worth of combustible pathways.

Even more beautiful than the ominous fire alarm and frightened ululations, is the _music_ of the fire that is somehow both audial and visual. Matthew can’t help that in each flicker and jump, the fire is rising and dipping an octave, switching key out of nowhere, each spark a cymbal clash of gleaming notes. It’s all so delectably _fascinating._ Matthew has never set fire to the inside of a building before, and he decides that the experience agrees with him. Even contained under low ceilings and between cramped cells, the fire is reminiscent of a wild beast, all teeth and untamed-

Matthew’s cell door is jerked open unceremoniously, and he is forcibly pulled out of his musing by a frantic, faceless guard who practically slings Matthew over his shoulder and hurries out of the blaze. As they pass the ganglion of the fire, Matthew reaches out his already-burned hand to stroke a tongue of flame, wondering why the sprinklers haven’t come on yet.

 _Budget cuts,_ he thinks with a smile, _we just can’t afford the water to save people’s lives._

An assembly of inmates already stands outside of the building, looking charred and bewildered, and Matthew joins them as he is dumped onto the ground abruptly. He stands up and tries to stagger and appear terrified like the other patients, and he hopes that the hand clamped over his mouth makes it seem like he is covering a smoke-induced cough rather than a fire-ignited laugh.

Already, a crimson brigade of trucks and scarlet-uniformed firefighters pours back and forth between flame and water, like a colony of ants in a glass tube tipped from one end to the other. Matthew’s fire balls into a fist and punches out several windows on the second floor, until wiry fingers grasp at useless window frames, trying to pull itself outside of the building entirely. Hoses are aimed, commands are shouted, but oh, the delicious ignitability of cheap linoleum and low quality drywall!

Suddenly, a shudder seems to run through the entire institution, and Matthew leans forward excitedly, but it is just vibrations from every sprinkler in the building turning on coetaneously. Matthew turns away disappointedly, unwilling to see his faithful destroyer destroyed. It seems that fortune has grown tired of mirth, and yawns instead, evoking working order in the institution sprinklers specifically to ruin Matthew’s pleasure.

With the sudden eruption of localized rainstorms within the building, the fire is quickly beaten down and turned into a mere ghost, wisps of incorporeal smoke like a phantasm of what once was. Matthew presses his lips together deciding not to feel sentimental, and instead revels in what he _had_ accomplished during the short lifespan of his makeshift fire.

Consider boredom to be thoroughly conquered.

* * *

 

The aftermath is uneventful and tedious. Unfortunately, the freak blaze had destroyed all security cameras in its area of origin, so the catalyst of the fire could not be identified. Sure, Matthew, the local incendiary gets a few odd looks, but no more than any other patient with easily explained burns on their hands. Matthew just smiles and layers inches worth of naïveté over himself when they question him, like he always does. In the end, they decide that a careless guard dropping a lit cigarette must have started the fire. It’s not like the inmates could get their hands on anything with the potential to start a blaze.

The hospital administrator is humbled by this incident, to say in the least. So humbled, the he resigns from the position and pursues an occupation wherein you’d be hard pressed to find even a spark. Matthew has to suppress a giggle when this news reaches him, so pleased is he at the shockwaves his little prank has kicked into motion. Of course, drawn out aftershocks are nothing compared to the true _action._ After a while, a sterile, chaos-free environment will incite unmatched impatience in a person.

Matthew stares at a scorch mark in the ceiling, overlooked and forgotten by the renovators. He worries his bottom lip between his burned fingers and breathes in the still-smoky air of his arid institution slowly.

He’s beginning to feel bored again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With some flint, steel, and very flammable tinder, you too kids, can start a fire out of nowhere! Generally, char is a lot better than paper and torn fabric. Char is great for fires: doesn't burst into flame as soon as sparks fly, but you'll get a flame with a few gentle breaths in no time. Of course, it's kind of hard to get your hands on cloth turned into charcoal in a mental institution. If you don't have char, laundry lint is also highly flammable, so you could try that too. Why do you think your mother warned you about high-heat dryers? Also: old linoleum is some dangerous stuff! Be careful, kiddos. (Your plaster should be safe though)
> 
> Wiki the Fic Writer signing out. Only YOU can prevent freak fire-related incidents.


	4. Pathological Lying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matthew is not an average pathological liar. He lies with purpose and without conscience. It's a good way to get out of trouble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The synonyms for pathological lying are so fun. Mythomania?? Pseudologica fantastica??? wicked!!!
> 
> bit of a shorter chapter this time, i'm working on writing more curtly and straightforward. i'm not sure if i like it; i kind of miss all the overbearing prose n' stuff. then again, this is kind of an action-y chapter so i suppose it fits.
> 
> tw for violence and slurs and teenagers being assholes

Matthew folds his hands in his lap neatly, like a good boy. He is careful not to let a single twitch or flicker cross his face, and he forces down the compulsion to bounce his right knee up and down. His spine is pressed flat against the back of a stiff chair, and his eyes are alert and attentive, fixed directly in front of him and not on the blood dripping steadily into his lap.

“I’m assuming that you are aware of the reason for your presence in my office, Mr. Brown,” states Mr. Hopkins, Matthew’s principal, in a strict, unyielding tone.

Matthew nods curtly, loosening more droplets of blood from his nostril. He makes no effort to conceal or stopper the crimson flow contumaciously exiting his nose.

Mr. Hopkins eyes the blood with unveiled disgust and wordlessly hands Matthew a tissue from the cardboard carton on his rigidly organized desk, perhaps the only soft and pliable object that resides atop its surface. Matthew disentangles one hand from the other and accepts the tissue just as reticently; his tarnished bruises and split knuckles startlingly macabre against pale skin in the colorless light filtering through the window behind Mr. Hopkins. He holds the soft tissue to his injured nose and instantly, a bloom of scarlet grows on white cotton.

“Then I hope you know why you are facing me alone, as well,” Mr. Hopkins continues, looking continually more repulsed as the seconds tick past on a minimalistic analog clock hung on the east wall of the office.

“No, sir. Unfortunately, I don’t,” Matthew replies, his voice a little muffled by the tissue. He purposefully includes a contraction in his answer, knowing full well that contrary to popular belief, use of contractions during an interrogation is more likely to be indicative of honesty. Matthew knows an awful lot about these subtleties of body and language, both in observation and action.

For example, Matthew knows exactly how Mr. Hopkins is feeling at the present moment. The principal’s posture is even more austere than usual, his lips are marginally thinned and his jaw muscles are taut from clenched teeth, and his pupils dilate ever so slightly when he looks directly at Matthew. Unwittingly, Mr. Hopkins is attempting to make himself appear larger, bracing for a fight, and allowing more light to reach his retinas in order to properly assess the environment.

Mr. Hopkins is afraid. He doesn’t know it, but Matthew does.

Ordinarily, the thought of a fully grown adult man being wary of an already-injured fifteen year old would be funny to Matthew, and he might do something to make Mr. Hopkins jump back in his seat for the fun of it, but that sort of exploitation is not Matthew’s current objective. Right now, he needs to make Mr. Hopkins trust him. Trust is the first step to deception.

Mr. Hopkins assesses Matthew carefully before explaining. “I had Mr. Foster tell me the story first. I want to hear the circumstances from the two of you, separately. If one of you lies, we’ll know.”

Matthew nods again, tissue bobbing up and down as he does so. He hunches his shoulders and wraps his free hand around his opposite elbow to make himself seem more vulnerable.

“So tell me, Mr. Brown,” says Mr. Hopkins, pushing his fingertips together to form a pyramids out of his hands, “What happened?”

Removing the tissue from its place over his nose and mouth so that he can speak clearly, Matthew begins his tale.

“You see sir, I walked into the courtyard when I finished lunch ‘cause I wanted some fresh air.” Matthew stresses his lisp so that it is a prominent component of his speech, careful not to overdo it.

_Matthew pushes aside a heavy door and exits the school building, brushing crumbs off of the front of his shirt. He’s still hungry, but his fosters haven’t been grocery shopping in weeks, so he doubts that his famine will be eradicated once he gets home. The thought makes Matthew furrow his brows and frown a little. He wonders if there’s anything good in the staff room, and how long it would take to get in and out with some proper foodstuffs._

“I was just minding my own business, y’know? Then out of nowhere, Jordan starts saying all this nasty stuff and cussing at me.”

Mr. Hopkins appears doubtful about Matthew’s claim. “Mr. Foster has never shown any hint of aggression until today. His behavioral records are- _were_ \- spotless.”

“Honest, Mr. Hopkins, he started it. Besides, there’s a lot that goes on around here that doesn’t go on paper.” Matthew hardens his gaze and tilts his head in challenge. “Doesn’t look so good for the school’s rep.”

This silences Mr. Hopkins for a moment. He averts his gaze, as if embarrassed and coughs lightly. “What sorts of statements was Mr. Foster making?” he asks hesitantly.

Matthew raises his eyebrows and leans back in the stiff chair, all confidence and cheek. “The usual slander,” he says with a shrug exuding the very essence of nonchalance, “Mostly homophobia. A smattering of choice insults to my mental state.”

_Across the courtyard, another boy yells, “Hey, cocksucker!”_

_Matthew ignores it. The shout comes from the mouth of Jordan Foster, the unfortunate victim of Matthew’s latest fire-related antics. It wasn’t really Jordan’s fault that Matthew happened to chance upon his wallet when walking home through the park. Nor was it Jordan’s fault when Matthew decided not to simply return the wallet the next day but do something fittingly amusing with it. And it_ definitely _wasn’t Jordan’s fault when Matthew set the wallet on fire and slipped it into his back pocket in the rush of lunch hour._

_It wasn’t that Matthew had anything against Jordan Foster; he just wanted to see what would happen. Looking back on it, Matthew can see that it was a moronic, impulsive decision. He should have been more careful, put more planning into the action so that he wouldn't get caught. It just so happened that Jordan Foster was something of the grudge-holding type, who didn’t appreciate having his fresh trousers burst into flame in the middle of a crowded secondary school hallway._

_“Brown, I’m talking to you!”_

_Matthew turns around, hand rising to his mouth to cover the unbidden smile. It all seems like a big joke to him, some strange pastiche of teenaged cliché and nickelodeon stereotype. Sliding his eyes around the courtyard, he takes note of the sizeable crowd forming around Jordan and himself, and the way the other boy projects his voice so it can be clearly heard even at the basketball hoops. Jordan plans to humiliate Matthew publicly and vocally. This is quite possibly the most banal and prosaic victimization that Matthew has ever been on the receiving end of. The whole situation is more comical than threatening._

_“What? Too retarded to talk?” Jordan mocks, a derisive grin of his own just spreading on his face like an oil spill._

_Matthew remains outwardly impassive, but if Jordan looked closely, he’d see the slight narrowing of Matthew’s eyes. He doesn’t, and instead takes a step nearer to Matthew, breaching his vesicle of personal territory. Up this close, Matthew can truly appreciate the pustules forming constellations across Jordan’s brow, glistening red globules threatening to burst with a good pencil-tip jab._

_“You weren’t nearly so silent getting fucked out back on Tuesday night. You moan like a slut, Brown, you know that?”_

_The elucidation of Matthew’s after school activities to a good percentage of the freshman population takes him by surprise. He wonders if he should feel indignation, mortification or outrage. He isn’t quite sure how to react towards the situation, feeling the first kernels of uncertainty budding in his stomach as he flits his gaze around the muttering courtyard. However, his doubt is short-lived, quickly giving way to a guise of brazen impertinence._

_“Well, I for one,” Matthew says slowly, drawling out each word, “Didn’t know you were into voyeurism.”_

_The retort arouses a laugh around the courtyard, and Jordan appears taken aback, the skin around his blemishes turning the same unsightly maroon. Matthew just smiles, his self-assurance restored by the sight of Jordan’s parted lips, ruddy cheeks, and widened eyes. Unexpected embarrassment is such a lovely sight on his adversaries._

_Although he appears somewhat more hesitant, Jordan is quick to jump back to the game of torment. “Kind of hard not to notice- weren’t exactly being quiet. Say, did the guy just feel sorry for your lisping ass, or are you whoring yourself out now?”_

_Definite anger effervesces from a dry spot just below Matthew’s ribcage. His spine stiffens automatically and he can feel heat emanating from his palms._ Rise in body temperature, posture stabilization, heart rate increase, _Matthew thinks,_ physiological response to provocation, indicates aggression.

_“Whoa hold up, I’m thinking the prostitution theory seems more plausible. Aren’t you like, adopted, or something? Heard you live in a shithole,” Jordan says in mock ignorance._

_“I’m fostered,” Matthew replies, his head too full of hornets and geysers to come up with a smart-alec reply._

_“Yeah?” Jordan raises an eyebrow sarcastically. “How much d’you charge for a blowjob then, or is it just food and board?”_

_Matthew crosses his arms across his chest and juts his chin out. “Sorry. Can’t suck what’s not there,” he answers with considerably more venom in his voice than before._

_Jordan’s face flushes with putrid blood, ugly blotchy red covering his cheeks and ears. “You’re a real faggot, Brown, you know that? You should just-”_

_Those are the last words of the day that Jordan Foster is able to speak intelligibly._

Mr. Hopkins nods, as if in agreement. He appears to ease up slightly, his jaw relaxing, his fingertips laying flat on the desk.

Matthew knows that the best lies are always seeded through with truth. Just as he hoped, Jordan’s report on the incident’s catalyst was authentic. Now, the story might go slightly awry.

“He hit me first,” Matthew says, “Socked me in the jaw.” He points at the large bruise purpling the left side of his face. “Still hurts like hell,” Matthew adds, delighting in the furrow of guilt and sympathy between Mr. Hopkins eyebrows.

_Matthew takes the first swing. And the second. The third, too._

_He grabs Jordan by the collar with his right hand, and reels back his left for another punch, but Jordan has largely recovered from surprise by now, and ducks, twisting out of Matthew’s grasp._

_With a jarring clack, Matthew’s teeth snap together, dangerously missing his tongue, as Jordan delivers a ferocious blow to the underside of Matthew’s head. The next shot lands somewhere along his midriff, and Matthew staggers, desperately trying to regain breath and control._

_The next few moments are blurred, punctuated only by flashes of pain, indecipherable curses, and an insect-esque buzz rising in the crowd around Matthew and Jordan. Like boxers in a ring, they are cheered and booed, but the two combatants are focused only on each other, on the pulsating thrum of the fight._

_Matthew’s knuckles meet Jordan’s mouth with a satisfyingly painful-sounding smack, the other boy’s lip splitting as he spits out a shard of something ivory and jagged. He clenches his fists together, not caring for the bare flesh over his knuckles, chest heaving with exertion as he watches Jordan stumble and trying to recover._

_When he lifts his head with renewed rage, Jordan looks beastly with blood running from his maw and his irises engulfed with black. So shockingly animalistic that Matthew doesn’t even see the devastating right hook that knocks him backwards and generates a blinding gush of scarlet from his nose. Matthew swears that he tastes the crunch more than he hears it, like the crushing of peanuts between molars or grinding prescription pills into powder. Broken glass from blown light bulbs scatter in Matthew’s brain, his vision scudded with pockmarks of pain._

_Ignoring the taste of iron and the heartbeat he thinks he can still feel in the blood exiting hastily from his nose, Matthew straightens up and punches Jordan in the face, again and again, until bruises blossom over his eye like violets in June- rotted, tattered, and overripe._

Mr. Hopkins twines his fingers together. “That’s not what I heard from Mr. Foster.”

Matthew shakes his head. “It’d be stupid to pick a fight with a guy like Jordan. He was just mad that I didn’t get embarrassed when he outed me in front of everyone. He wanted to humiliate me, so he decided an ass-kicking was as good as anything.”

The principal considers this with a mild frown.

“He had the upper hand most of the time. I only fought back for self-defense,” Matthew declares earnestly.

_In a fair fight, Jordan would probably win. It’s not that Matthew is weak. He’s been in a reasonable share of street brawls and swimming has made him tough and wiry. Even so, he can’t hold out long against a tank like Jordan Foster. Thus, it’s a good thing that Matthew doesn’t fight fair._

_Just as Jordan wrenches Matthew away from his face and draws back a fist to deliver retribution, Matthew drops to the ground and kicks Jordan’s legs out from underneath him. The other boy lands on his back, stunned and Matthew clambers on top of his chest, pinning him in place._

_“Get off of me, you fucking fag!” Jordan hisses, his mouth bubbling over with more blood and his words obscured by pain._ _A little slow on the uptake, Matthew realizes the absolute hilarity of his current position, and slides himself back further with a crazed grin, until he is straddling Jordan’s hips._

_Jordan opens his mouth to protest again, but Matthew shuts it with a rapid left hook that ejects more blood and snaps his head to the side with alarming force. Matthew is laughing now, and the crowd seems unnerved by his madcap hedonism, one onlooker dashing away to find a figure of authority to curb Matthew’s lustful violence. He propels blow after blow with growing glee, until Jordan’s face is more mauve and burgundy than the free-range eggshell it was before. Matthew grinds his pelvis into Jordan’s with each punch, practically cackling to himself at the sounds of the moans he receives, whether from pleasure or pain, Matthew does not know._

_Jordan sinks his teeth into the side of Matthew’s hand the next time he lands a punch near Jordan’s mouth, dragging a yelp and burst of blood from Matthew simultaneously. “Kinky,” Matthew giggles. He slams the same hand into the side of Jordan’s head, staining the other boy’s temple with gore spewing from his knuckles._

_Strong arms hook under Matthew’s, yanking his hands back so that he can’t do any more damage. “I can’t believe you’re getting off on this,_ Foster _. Who pops a boner over getting wrecked?” Matthew guffaws mockingly, the last thing he says before he is dragged away. He goes limp, too gorged on violence to protest._

“Really, I came out of that fight worse,” Matthew says.

“You gave Mr. Foster a _concussion_ ,” Mr. Hopkins points out

“He was only out for half a minute,” objects Matthew, “Besides, whatever I did, I did out of necessity. He threatened to kill me!”

Mr. Hopkins goes rigid, his focus on Matthew suddenly intense. “Are you sure about that, Mr. Brown? We take death threats _very_ seriously.”

 _I’m sure you do,_ Matthew thinks. “The guy’s a bigot. Hell if I know what I did to deserve him on my case. He was practically gonna murder me, I swear.”

“I just can’t believe it! Even at this school…” Mr. Hopkins shakes his head in disbelief.

_Especially at this school._

“We pride ourselves on acceptance here, you know that, don’t you Mr. Brown?”

Matthew nods.

“I will be investigating this incident personally,” Mr. Hopkins says with a sigh, rubbing at his right temple, “Whatever punishment doled out will be just.”

Matthew stands up, putting on a pleasant smile that hurts his face. “Thank you, Mr. Hopkins. I believe that you’ll do everything in your power to help me.” He exits the office without waiting to be dismissed and purposefully lets a drop of blood fall on Mr. Hopkins’ immaculate carpet.

Matthew listens to his shoes squeaking slightly in the school hallway as he wonders what lie to tell his foster parents when they ask about his injuries.

 


	5. Cunning and Manipulativeness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matthew isn't satisfied with his current work position.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey hey hey chilton's back and sassier than ever  
> a real dialogue heavy chapter, sorry

Matthew whistles as he pushes a food cart down the long corridor, enjoying the feeling of jovial air blowing past his lips. The light swish of his white uniform adjusting as he moves sounds as airy as he acts, the ring of keys at his hip jingling at a convivial rhythm. He offers a smile and a tray of food to each inmate, the latex gloves over his hands like a second skin preventing any contact but his outwardly sunny disposition reaching through the cells all the same. He doesn’t say anything, of course, but there’s no rule against smiling.

When every patient in D Wing has received breakfast, Matthew pushes the empty metal cart back into an unlit, arid room full of other identical, multi-purpose carts. He locks the door behind him with a flourish, almost running into another orderly as he turns around.

“Sorry Adrian, didn’t see you there.” Matthew takes a step backwards as he apologizes, so that his shoulder blades brush against the nearest wall.

Adrian straightens up considerably when he sees Matthew, running a hand through his clearly-uncombed hair. “No, no, it was my fault. You’re fine.”

Matthew shrugs. “Whatever you say.”

“Did you finish up in D Wing?” Adrian asks, rubbing at the stubble at his chin.

“Whole building’s done by now.”

Adrian looses a tired sigh, and puts a calloused hand on Matthew’s shoulder. “Let’s go for coffee, then.”

As the two of them make their way towards the staff room, Matthew evaluates Adrian carefully. The other man’s posture is gradually growing more hunched with each step, and the bags under his eyes indicating yet another restless night. He looks unkempt and sickly, his clothes rumpled and smelling unwashed. All in all, Adrian appears to droop, like a wax candle on a sweltering summer day.

Matthew begins humming jauntily under his breath, just loud enough to be picked up by someone in close proximity. Their paired footsteps add to the beat, each little noise echoing about in the empty hallway. The fluorescent lights seem not eerie, but safe and clean. About halfway down, Matthew quickens his stride so that he is a half-step in front of Adrian and reaches the staff room first.

“Black?” Matthew asks, his hand already on the coffeepot handle.

“As always,” Adrian answers with a nod, and settles into the nearest chair, its legs creaking like an unused trapdoor under his weight.

Matthew makes quick work of the coffee, and pours it into two cups, leaving one untouched and dumping copious amounts of cream and sugar in the other. He places both cups on the squat little table where Adrian sits and wraps his fingers around cream-laden one. The coffee is still piping hot, with snakes of steam evaporating in the significantly cooler air, and Matthew almost sears his palms even through a layer of Styrofoam. He taps his fingertips against the side of the cup and leans down over its brim, whistling again so that the air creates ripples over the surface of his beige drink.

Tapping his fingers to the beat of Matthew blown-glass melody, Adrian eyes his companion with guarded jealousy. His own coffee is as dark as his pupils, and he takes a drawn out sip from it without ever taking his gaze off of Matthew. Finally, he lowers his cup with a weary exhale and mutters, “I just don’t get it.”

“Don’t get what?” says Matthew, tilting his head curiously and feigning ignorance.

“How you stay so…” Adrian pauses, his hand flapping in the open air like a bird with a broken wing as he searches for a suitable word, “Light.”

Matthew shrugs, and dips his left index finger into his coffee to test its temperature. “Well, I try to stay away from rich food and fattening products, for one,” he replies blithely.

This wrings a dry laugh out of Adrian. “With the amount of cream and sugar you put in that? I don’t think so,” he chortles. However, the moment of mirth soon passes, and Adrian sags again, his sombre aura returning like a roosting bat at the sight of dawn, the sun’s harbinger. “But in all seriousness-” He stops. “Doesn’t this place ever bog you down?”

Taking his time, Matthew lifts the brim of the cup to his mouth and lets a few drops of sweet caffeine touch his tongue. He licks his lips and gives an ambiguous shrug again. “I like to remind myself that I could be on the other side of the bars. After that, being an orderly doesn’t seem so bad.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Adrian says hesitantly.

Matthew grins crookedly, one side of his face lifting more than the other. “Liven up, you’re head orderly! You get to boss around the rest of us saps. Me? I gotta report to the likes of you.”

Adrian chuckles softly, a brief glimmer of joy that is just as speedily replaced by listlessness.

“Hey, don’t beat yourself up for feeling down, either,” Matthew adds, lowering his voice and adopting a comforting tone, “We’ve all got our off days.”

“More like off months,” says Adrian, rubbing at his temple so that the skin around his forehead is stretched and warped, “Haven’t felt _on_ since spring. Glad you got hired around then, or who knows where I’d be now.”

“Don’t give me all the credit,” Matthew replies humbly, secretly pleased that his machinations worked so well, “You’re a tough guy. You’d be doing just fine without me.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” mumbles Adrian, refusing to meet Matthew’s eyes and staring down at his reflection in the coffee instead. He frowns as if disappointed by what he sees.

“I suppose some moral support is always good,” agrees Matthew.

Adrian looks away from his coffee and fixes his gaze on the doorway instead. “Not really getting much of that lately,” he says bitterly.

“Yeah?” says Matthew, his interest suddenly peaking. He leans over the table, prompting Adrian to turn and face him. “What’s that about?”

The head orderly shifts his eyes around the room as if somebody else in the empty area might be listening in. “My wife’s been… I don’t know, distant, lately.”

“Might just be you,” Matthew says wisely, “You work so hard you probably don’t get to see her much.”

Adrian winces, his head lowering, his hand shifting so that they’re in front of him. Matthew is delighted to see that he has succeeded in making the other man feel guilty, and further presses him. “With a big job likes this, you gotta spend a lot of long hours away from home, it’s just a natural consequence that some relationships will be jeopardized.”

“I didn’t mean for this to happen!” protests Adrian, “I’m only doing this to support us!” His tone is pleading, his eyes round, as if begging Matthew for forgiveness or some reprieve from shame.

Matthew remains impassive, settling back in his seat even as Adrian leans forward. “She might not know that,” he says softly, his voice gentle but his words condemning and harsh, “If your husband spends most of his time out of the house, and says he’s ‘working’… well, the automatic assumption definitely calls for some distance. Maybe even retribution.”

Adrian swallows, both transfixed on Matthew and recoiling at the implication. “Patricia? She wouldn’t cheat. Never.” He seems more intent on reassuring himself than arguing with Matthew.

“What if she thinks that you haven’t held up your end of the bargain?” inquires Matthew, raising an eyebrow, “What if she thinks that she doesn’t need to hold up hers anymore?”

“Oh god. You’re right,” Adrian breathes, a look of horror passing his face as he melts back into his own chair, utterly spent and defeated.

“It’s not your fault,” soothes Matthew, the hard edges in his voice sanded away to spherical sympathy, “You just wanted the best.”

“Doesn’t matter,” says Adrian, his eyebrows furrowing, “I messed up.”

Matthew takes another swig of coffee, rolling a few grains of undissolved sugar around on his tongue and waiting for them to liquefy into sweet nothingness before speaking. “If you want to really tell her that you’re sorry, you have to show her.”

Adrian squints harder, once hand clenched around his cup, the other running nervously through his hair again. “Maybe I’ll bring up different hours with Chilton.”

“But he doesn’t have to give you them,” points out Matthew, “And knowing him, he won’t.”

Adrian sighs and turns his attention to the hairline cracks in the ceiling, reluctant to face the final truth. “One thing he can’t stop me from, though,” he utters slowly, “Is quitting.”

Matthew pretends to be shocked, as if he hadn’t been needling Adrian towards this outcome already. Below the surface, a deep flush of pleasure runs through Matthew, and he congratulates himself on manipulating Adrian so that the head orderly would believe that quitting was his own idea. It’s always best to give the victim the illusion of choice, even when only one desired conclusion exists.

“Are you sure about that, Adrian? Quitting can’t be the only option, I mean, Chilton’s helpless, this place’ll be overrun in a week without you,” Matthew splutters with mock concern.

Adrian nods. “If I’m honest with myself, I’ve been thinking about quitting for awhile.”

Matthew has to stifle a laugh at that.

“This place isn’t good for me,” continues Adrian, “It’s a literal madhouse, and sometimes I wonder if insanity is contagious. I think some time away would be… beneficial.”

“I suppose I can see where you’re coming from,” Matthew says quietly, “Chaotic environments aren’t exactly great for the mind. Hanging out with lunatics isn’t gonna help, either, so better sooner than later.”

“Wonder if Chilton’s busy right now,” Adrian says, eying the door, “I want to get out of here before it’s too late.”

“Maybe you can work in a regular hospital instead.”

Adrian smiles a little sadly and stands up, pushing his chair back with a horrid scraping noise. “Stay sane. I’ll put in a good word for you in my resignation.”

Matthew grins back. “Thanks. Same goes to you. About the sanity, I mean.”

“I should be the one thanking you,” Adrian says, straightening his uniform and starting to exit the room, “You’ve been a real friend, Matthew.”

“No problem,” Matthew replies loftily, giving Adrian a little salute as he leaves the room. Matthew remains in his seat, one ankle resting over his other knee, his foot jiggling to an invisible beat, and sips his still-warm coffee languidly, sweet brown liquid coating his smile.

 

Adrian had already gone home (and hopefully resigned as well), by the time that Matthew brings out the carts again for dinner. Not much had happened after Matthew finished his coffee and returned to work. No patients needed to be transported, no visitors needed to be pointed in the right direction, no psychiatrists needed to be guarded while they analyzed and messed with the minds of inmates.

Matthew isn’t quite sure how prison meals really differ from each time of day. He supposes that the breakfast portion is smaller and greyer looking from dinner rations, but other than that, the two are largely the same: unappetizing, mush-like, and mysterious in terms of origin. He is fairly certain that it says somewhere in his contract that he is legally forbidden to discuss the true contents of prison meals to patients or outsiders, in case a lawsuit regarding inhumane treatment might arise.

The cart squeaks lightly as Matthew pushes it down the hallway, but he doesn’t make any effort to ease the sound, instead pushing down on the cart at such an angle that the sound grows louder. He lets the screeching car ring out in great peals, heralding his arrival long before he appears. It’s a vindictive move, but Matthew feels that the inmates deserve it for all the racket and clamor they make at other times.

Cell by cell, Matthew hands out food trays, keeping his distance from the bars, detached, reserved and cautious as a good orderly should be. He spares no time for offhanded grins, and works efficiently. No rush, but no lag either. Eventually, he works himself into a mechanical rhythm. Push cart, clinking of utensils, lift tray up, shove it through cell bars. His movements are precisely practiced, like a piece of well-oiled machinery in a textile factory, pulling strands of identical thread through cloth and back again without a hitch.

Once he’s made his rounds, Matthew returns the cart to its nest of bare cement and metal brethren, strips off his gloves as one might strip skin off of ripe fruit, and walks briskly down a monotonous hallway that is somehow more prosaic than the rest. The corridor is strangely empty, clearing a yawning path before Matthew like the widening mouth of a cave, opening up to something other than stifling claustrophobia.

Matthew raps his knuckles smartly over polished wood, barely waiting for a muffled invitation before entering the room. He closes the door with a quiet click, and seats himself without being asked.

“Dr. Chilton,” he says with a nod, all business and flat-edged professionalism.

“Mr. Brown,” returns Chilton, interest lighting up his face, “What brings you here?” He pushes his papers to one side and locks his fingers together, one thumb tapping rhythmically over the other.

“You see, sir,” Matthew says, carefully choosing each word in his head before voicing it, “I’ve been working here for six months: long enough to get to know the place, the people, the routine. I’m sure that all my work has been exemplary, and I am more devoted to this job than anyone else.”

Chilton raises an eyebrow. “Go on.”

Matthew steels his gaze and lifts his chin ever so slightly. “I want a promotion.”

“A promotion,” repeats Chilton, a bright flicker dashing across his eyes. He leans back into his lavish chair and props up an ankle over the opposite knee, twirling a gold-capped fountain pen in his right hand. “You want a promotion.”

Matthew doesn’t reply to that, leaving the conversation in silence to prompt further word from Chilton.

“Well, it’s like you said,” the hospital administrator continues, the amused lilt still lathering each of his words in enthuse and delight, “You’ve been employed for half a year. As far as I’m concerned, you’re still a fresh recruit. Bit of an ambitious request, don’t you think?”

“Ambition is the driving force behind success,” Matthew replies simply, “And I intend to become very successful.”

Chilton smiles, flicking his gaze down to his pant leg before returning it to Matthew. “I admire your drive, Mr. Brown.”

“It keeps me stable.”

Matthew watches Chilton consider this with rapt attention, observing the psychiatrist’s every subtle reaction. The inward head tilt, stopping of pen-fiddling, and opening of body language all indicate that Matthew is so far successful in capturing the interest of Chilton.

“A stable mind would do some good around here,” says Chilton musingly. He slides his ankle off of his knee and onto the ground, and places both palms flat on the desk in front of him. He looks straight at Matthew, the slight curl in his lip replaced with a flat line. “But what if,” he pauses for dramatic effect, “There is no position that I can currently offer you?”

 _He’s playing coy,_ thinks Matthew, knowing for sure that the head orderly position at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane had been just vacated. He decides to play along.

“That would be awfully unfortunate,” Matthew sighs, “Because what this place needs is a good dose of stability.”

Chilton lifts his jaw, affronted. “Care to elaborate?”

“Of course, you do your best, sir, but there’s only so much power in a management position,” Matthew enunciates, his body stock-still as he speaks, “You don’t really _know_ what happens in the flesh- it’s all second hand. That’s why you need someone stable to be your liege. You need someone you can trust.”

A smile spreads across Chilton’s face like softened butter, right forefinger jumping to support his cheek as he leans his head to one side. “You’re implying that I can trust you.”

“I’m implying that there are some that you can’t, or shouldn’t trust,” Matthew corrects evasively.

“That’s quite an accusation to make,” Chilton says, now tapping a finger around the edge of his mouth.

“It’s nothing personal,” replies Matthew with a shrug, “I’m just concerned for the hospital’s sake. You do so much work to keep it pristine; it would be an awful shame if one instability, one weak link in the chain, caused everything to go awry.”

Chilton nods absentmindedly, a faraway look passing over his face as he stares unseeingly at the surface of his desk. “It would be, wouldn’t it,” he mutters.

“But of course,” Matthew adds, “If there is no position available, I’ll be perfectly happy to wait until one opens up.”

“Actually, as it happens, there _is_ a position currently available;” Chilton comments offhandedly, “Fate is on your side.”

“Is that so?” Matthew says breezily, “What a coincidence.”

“Don’t get too excited,” warns Chilton, “I can’t give you any guarantees. I might just give the position to a more… experienced employee.”

Matthew nods agreeably, smiling pleasantly. “The choice is yours, Dr. Chilton. I _trust_ that you’ll make the right one.”

Chilton tears off the topmost piece of paper from a notepad and scribbles something down on it, lips moving silently to form the written words as he inscribes a reminder. When he finishes, he looks up and flashes his teeth at Matthew. “I’ll think about it. Have a good day, Matthew.”

“You too, Dr. Chilton,” says Matthew.

He stands up and exits Chilton’s office quickly, heading down the corridor to clock out for the day. He pauses underneath the flickering fluorescent light (still blinking at shuttered intervals even after six months), pondering whether there’s any particular significance to how Chilton only uses Matthew’s first name when he is leaving. Matthew thinks that he should persuade Chilton to drop formalities around him at a later date; a guise of familiarity might make him easier to manipulate.

Workplace etiquette and all, screwing with Chilton is a walk in the park for Matthew. One compliment, and the hospital administrator would become as pliant as sopping riverbed clay. Adrian too- what a pathetic sap! He can’t believe that he didn’t put this plan into action sooner.

Starting up a radio show jingle between his pursed lips again, Matthew wonders if he can afford a new apartment with his soon-to-be inflated paycheck.


	6. Lack of Guilt or Remorse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sacrament of Confession has disappointingly little effect on Matthew Brown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey it's been awhile but i'm back with almost 8 000 words worth of matthew being a little shit ie. this is way longer than i thought it would be
> 
> i am so so sorry for everything
> 
> tw for ableist slurs, child abuse, violence, dubious consent and underage sex ew

Matthew stares at himself in the mirror while he brushes his teeth. Running coarse, asperous bristles over his molars and incisors, he tilts his head to the side, wondering when the prophesied changes of his tender age will begin to show. He jabs his toothbrush amidst his jaws so that it creates a bulge on his smooth, pale, cheek, still unmarked by facial hair or rosacea. Matthew pulls the unbending plastic out of his mouth and grins at his reflection, waves of fluoride froth and sputum surging from the gaps between gleaming, pearly enamel, running down his chin in rivulets. As the bluish liquid reaches his neck, Matthew bends over the basin and spits, bringing the brim of a chipped mug to his mouth so he can rinse away the rest of the foam. Once everything foul and unwanted is ejected from inside, he wipes his face with a soiled washcloth and steps down from the teetering wooden stool, embedding a splinter in the arch of his foot in the process.

“Matthew!”

“Coming, Mrs. Demme!” Matthew hollers back, slamming the rickety bathroom door shut behind him and almost tripping over a hockey stick as he stumbles into his shared bedroom.

“Hurry up or we’ll be late for church!” Mrs. Demme yells, clanging together several rusted pieces of old kitchenware as she presumably throws them in the sink downstairs.

Matthew huffs and drops onto his insubstantial mattress spread-eagled, sending little puffs of dust up from the bed frame. Jonathan has already gotten dressed and left the room, so Matthew has the cramped, cluttered space all to himself. He glances at the doggedly-ticking alarm clock placed haphazardly on the dresser and pulls down his boxer briefs, assuring himself that he has enough time for a quick jerk.

“ _Matthew!_ Get your ass down here before I beat it!” Mrs. Demme screams, more dangerous clunking sounding from below.

With a hearty sigh, Matthew pulls on his boxers and his church pants simultaneously. “Nagging bitch,” he mutters, shrugging on a clean shirt as he staggers downstairs.

As expected, Ms. Demme is fuming when Matthew waltzes into the kitchen and snatches a piece of burned toast. He ducks when she swipes out an arm to swat him, but her other hand cuffs him on the side of the head, knocking him into the kitchen counter.

“Every time!” Mrs. Demme shouts, throwing flecks of spittle in Matthew’s face, “Every _goddamn_ time, we’re late and it’s because of this ungrateful retard! Do you know how they _look_ at us when we walk in after-”

Matthew stops listening at this point, instead turning his attention to the rest of his foster family sitting around a squat, second-hand table. Mr. Demme forcibly keeps his eyes focussed on his newspaper, seemingly impassive to the bloodbath before him, and Jonathan watches Matthew getting chewed out with an undisguised smirk.

Ms. Demme strikes Matthew across the face with the back of her hand for not paying attention, leaving a livid red mark with two indentations from rings on his cheekbone. Matthew winces and steps backwards, half of him in a mind to flee, the other half in a mind to murder Mrs. Demme.

“Teach him a lesson, Anthony,” Mrs. Demme seethes at her sedentary husband, pointing an ugly, jewelled finger in Matthew’s face, “Do it! Fucking brat needs the-”

Mr. Demme slaps his rolled up newspaper on the table with such force that the whole family jumps and Matthew almost drops the crumpled toast he holds behind his back. The only sound that can be heard is the faucet’s staggered dripping as Mr. Demme glares everyone else down. “Get in the car,” he says at last, his tone utterly disgusted as he looks right at Matthew.

Mrs. Demme and Jonathan scurry towards the door without protest, but Matthew remains rooted to the spot, stubbornly refusing to move. He’s not sure if it is defiance or fear that paralyzes him so acutely as Mr. Demme slowly rises from his seat and advances towards Matthew.

Without warning, Mr. Demme grabs Matthew by the collar and slams him against the refrigerator, causing branches of dull pain to bloom all the way up Matthew’s spine, and running a shudder through the large, metal appliance. Matthew yelps unwittingly as the breath is forcibly knocked from his lungs by the pressure Mr. Demme applies on his sternum.

“Now, listen closely,” Mr. Demme says in a dangerously low voice, his cold eyes parallel to Matthew’s, “You might think that you have the upper hand in whatever game you’re playing at, but you don’t. You’re at _my_ mercy, and that’s how it’ll stay. Forget your place again and well… maybe you can go running to the CPS. Or maybe they’ll do absolutely jack shit like they always do. Understand?”

After Matthew nods infinitesimally, and Mr. Demme drops him unceremoniously, turning on his heel towards the front door, only pausing to say, “Do something about your hair.”

Matthew rubs his throat and scowls at Mr. Demme’s departing back. He straightens his collar and runs a stiff hand through his unruly, dark locks and exits the house with as much dignity that is left to him. The Demmes have already become unbearable after only four months. They’re far from the first foster family to treat him less than kindly, but the rate at which they have achieved this hostility is astounding, impressive, even.

As soon as Matthew opens and slams shut the ill-fitting rear right car door, Mr. Demme manoeuvres the outdated automobile out of the driveway at such a rate that tire squeals can be heard throughout the neighbourhood, and black skid marks are left on weathered concrete. The drive to church is frosty and silen,t like a funeral on winter solstice, strangers paying respects together in bleak, cold sun. Matthew chews on his toast as quietly as possible, staring blankly out the cracked window as he wishes that if there was one thing different in his life, he could just sleep in on Saturdays like a normal kid. He is not the least bit apologetic about making his foster family late for church. If he anything, he had taken so long with brushing his teeth on purpose.

Why does he always get landed with Catholic families, anyway? Matthew has a feeling that there is someone behind the curtain of the Maryland Foster Care Agency pulling strings so that he ends up with every single die-hard Roman Catholic clan in Baltimore. Even his _name_ is tinged with doctrine (the _Book of Matthew_ , and Reverend Brown, a fat old man who took an unusual interest in altar boys). Admittedly, the force-feeding of religion might have been beneficial to any other ward of state abandoned by parents who didn’t believe in abortion. Unfortunately, Matthew isn’t any other ward of state, and biblical stories of wrath and bloodshed have an undesired effect on him.

The car jolts to a stop, and Matthew almost smacks his forehead on the seat in front of him. He exits the vehicle hastily, brushing crumbs off of his shirt, as Jonathan shoves his way out. Without being asked, he makes his way inside of the church, tilting his head up to gaze at the curved ceiling of the cathedral as he always does, wondering how much more usable space there would be if the building’s height was translated into length and width. He is amused to find that the Demmes are not late for church at all, and half of the pews are still empty. He ends up with half of his body squeezed onto the edge of a polished wooden bench anyway, as Mrs. Demme insists on the family sitting up front to hear Reverend Matthews’ (It keeps happening!) sermon.

Matthew entertains himself throughout the first hour of church by studying the churchgoers around him and imagining how they might come to their gruesomely detailed ends. Too caught up in picturing the man with a paisley tie two rows over slipping in the supermarket and hitting his head on the yogurt shelf, the Reverend’s words fall over Matthew’s ears like limpid, crystalline water over moss-covered river rocks. So engrossed is Matthew’s mind in simulating the exact jarring crunch of an adult cranium giving way to gravity and metal, that he is momentarily confused as Mrs. Demme shoves him off of the pew and up towards the altar.

Years of jumping down from the wrong side of fences serves Matthew well in this instant, and he regains his balance without much trouble. Looking around, bewildered, he wonders why he is the only one standing. Matthew thinks that he has seen it all, but he may be wrong. Perhaps this is some sort of intensely obscure Christian ritual, involving the public embarassment of a young boy on the cusp of maturity in a cathedral.

“Go,” Mrs. Demme hisses, pointing to the confessional box and shoving him again.

Matthew enters the confessional slowly, just to infuriate Mrs. Demme, pushing aside the velvet curtain and kneeling with the urgency of a jewel-eyed dragonfly on a breezy summer day. He straightens up and faces the metal lattice in front of him, feeling a little spooked by the looming silhouette behind it, even though he knows that it is just gauche, graceless Reverend Matthews.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” Matthew murmurs, ever the practiced Catholic. He places his fingers on his forehead, his chest, and each shoulder in turn, crossing himself more out of habit than of holistic intent.

“When was the last you confessed, my son?” the veiled figure intones, his baritone voice heavy and fluid like chrism.

“3 weeks ago,” answers Matthew, displeased that he must go through this ordeal again after such a short period of time.

“Every sin, both original and actual,” Reverend Matthews says after a brief pause, “Being a transgression of the righteous law of God, and contrary thereunto, doth, in its own nature, bring guilt upon the sinner (Matthew doesn’t quite agree with this bit), whereby he is bound over to the wrath of God (Matthew is fairly sure that wrath is a sin), and curse of the law, and so made subject to death, with all miseries spiritual, temporal, and eternal.” He pauses and shifts in his perch, casting a wider shadow over the kneeling boy. “Confess, sinner, if you wish to be forgiven.”

“I sought revenge on a classmate after he insulted me.”

* * *

 

Matthew sits in a cramped school desk-and-chair, covered with the initials of past pupils, generations of outdated curses, and enough scrawled lewd imagery to fill an orgiastic pornographic film. A sheet of paper slides onto the small table’s cratered surface, and Matthew snatches it to his chest before anyone else can see the two-digit number written on its top in fast drying permanent ink. He takes a peek at the paper and crumples with disappointment at the 47% inscribed in condemning red.

Scott, the local busybody, leans over to Matthew’s desk, intent on crowing his academic superiority in seventh grade math to the entire class. “What did _you_ get, Matt?”

Matthew flattens his test paper to his chest reflexively, but it’s already too late. The scarlet ink has bled through the cheap paper anyway, and if one was determined enough, it wouldn’t take too long to discern Matthew’s percentage through the back.

“Wow, _another_ fail?” Scott says disparagingly, keeping his voice whisper-like as if he is holding a private conversation with Matthew instead of announcing it to everyone in the room, “Better luck next time.”

“Scott!” Ms. Gumb warns sharply, “Don’t ask for others’ test marks unless they tell you.”

“Sorry, ma’am,” Scott replies, smiling sweetly, before lowering his voice and saying to Matthew, “You think they let retards graduate?”

Matthew’s hands slide from clutching the paper at his chest to resting on top of his knees. His test flutters to the floor, forgotten and spurned. “What did you say?”

Scott keeps smiling. “I said,” he enunciates slowly, as if Matthew is stupid, “Do you think that they let retards graduate?”

“I’m not a retard,” Matthew snaps back, his knees knocking together as he bounces them up and down.

“That percentage says otherwise,” Scott says derisively, “’Sides, the whole school knows about your file.”

Matthew turns away jerkily, and tries to cool his temper. He hates being smarter than everyone else, but somehow coming up subpar in terms of marks. The fucking lisp doesn’t help his reputation either, and the myriad of diagnoses filed by snotty child psychologists are as damning as murder. He decides to go to the toilet to calm down, and asks to be excused, but halfway out of his seat, he has a better idea.

With the righteous anger of an offended adolescent, Matthew hip-checks Scott’s desk at the precise angle necessary so that it falls on Scott, generates enough force to knock his chair down and brings Scott himself crashing onto the floor.

“What the-” is all that Scott has the time to say before his chair hits tile with a jarring clack, and his desk thuds on top of his chest with a thump that even Matthew admits sounds sickening. The force of the falling desk causes all the wind in Scott to be forcibly exhaled and his first few seconds on the ground are spent scrabbling for air while the rest of the math class watches in astonishment at the sudden fall. Matthew thinks that Scott’s beetle-like actions are hilarious, and that it is astoundingly easy to make someone helpless in moments.

“What have you done, Matthew?” cries Ms. Gumb, as a few surrounding students help Scott up and right his desk and chair.

“I’m sorry, it was an accident!” he pleads, appealing to Ms. Gumb’s pity for poor, dumb, lisping Matthew.

Ms. Gumb softens visibly and clears her throat to fill up time. “Just… apologize to Scott.”

“I’m sorry,” Matthew repeats, turning to a considerably more dishevelled Scott, his voice dripping with regret but his eyes gleaming with mirth, “For unintentionally overturning your desk.”

Matthew has long since mastered the art of apologizing without really apologizing, as well as the fine skill of conveying only to his target, that he is not sorry at all.

“Here, I can take him to the nurse’s,” Matthew offers, and yanks Scott out of the room without waiting for an answer.

Scott is practically spitting with rage. “You are-“

“Very clumsy? I know,” Matthew sighs, shepherding the other boy down a long corridor filled with the white noise of other classrooms.

“I can get there myself,” snarls Scott, trying to jerk his arm out of Matthew’s grasp.

Matthew doesn’t relent, and instead tightens his grip. “I really do regret what happened,” he says loftily, without a grain of genuine guilt in his words, “Don’t you?”

* * *

 

“Anger will only burn away the soul,” Reverend Matthews murmurs, “What else is there?”

“I stole from the convenience store.”

* * *

 

Matthew ducks into the corner store, looking to hide away from a tempestuous March day indoors. He grins at the employee at the till as he shrugs off his too-big donation bin overcoat and slings it over his shoulder, strolling down an aisle of cheap paperbacks pretending to be interested in the latest series of harlequin romance novels.

He digs into the bottomless depths of his torn jeans, rolled up four times at the cuffs, spurred by the sound of jingling metal as he shakes, but it turns out to be the tab of a soda can knocking against a stray nickel. Overturning his pockets, he finds that the only other contents of his jeans are a few strands of thread, a library receipt, and a bent paperclip. As cheap as items sold in a convenience store might be, five cents, paper, string, and bits of metal are not going to get him far.

Pinching his lower lip in bad habit, Matthew wanders up and down the literature aisle until he can memorize the order of mysteries to thrillers to romances to fantasies. He turns left into the household items aisle, bending down to inspect the price of a plastic blue dustpan. To the casual onlooker, he is thoughtful and serious, as if legitimately considering whether to buy the corporate brand sponges or the more economical no-name ones, up to no trouble at all. Even to the intensive onlooker, Matthew exudes the impression of being an honest customer with no ulterior intentions but to find the best deal on absorbent cleaning supplies. Unfortunately for the lone, unconcerned employee at the cash register bobbing her head to the beat of subtle muzak, the opposite could not have been truer.

Matthew exits the household items aisle and zigzags his way through the consecutive lanes. He passes snack and food items, stationary, crafts and art supplies until he reaches the self care aisle. It is here that Matthew drops his facade of idle consumerism, and becomes vigilant of his surroundings. He peers up and down the aisle for other shoppers, shrugging his coat on as a cover, and adjusts as few boxes of shaving razors so that they cover up the gaps in the shelves, effectively hiding him from the sight of anyone in the crafts aisle. With as much casual nonchalance as he can muster, he scopes out the store’s ceiling for security cameras, pleased to find that there are none. The metaphorical coast is as clear as its imaginary crystalline Caribbean waters- that is to say, so distractingly dazzling that it is near opaque. Matthew decides to leave the proper simile-concocting for later.

Underneath an array of reasonably priced sunscreen is an assortment of basic medical supplies: gauze, healing salve, disinfectant spray, you name it. The vertical placement of these items are conveniently at pretending-to-bend-down-and-tie-shoes height for Matthew, and he wastes no time taking advantage of it.

As his right hand tugs on the knobbly end of a shoelace to loosen it, his left reaches for a pack of heavy duty Band-Aids. With the shoelaces of his left sneaker untied and limp like dead snakes, he deposits the rattling box into the torn lining of his coat. He picks up both shoestrings, crosses them, tucks one string inside of the loop he has created, and grabs a roll of medical tape as his hand pulls the shoelace outwards to tighten the first knot. With the tape slung around his left index and middle fingers like a large, sticky key ring, Matthew’s hand deftly dives into the right side of his coat, and when it emerges, the tape has disappeared from sight, merely a round lump in his jacket lining. Matthew shifts so that he is facing the shelf instead of kneeling parallel to it, and makes a small loop in his shoelace with his left hand, and snatches a travel-size bottle of Neosporin with his right, the motion a mere blur of pale skin darting out. He tucks the spray in his breast pocket so that he can feel the minuscule bottle nudge his chest when he leans back after finishing a perfect bow knot on his left sneaker.

Matthew does up the right one too, for good measure, then stands up, stretching a little to get rid of the stiffness in his knees. He yawns, and emerges from the self care aisle with a disappointed expression on his face.

“Didn’t find what you were looking for?” the cashier asks, her elbow propping up her head as she leans over the counter.

Matthew shakes his head. “I was looking for waterproof Band Aids, but there was only regular.”

The cashier raises a plucked eyebrow. “Waterproof, huh? That’s pretty specific.”

Matthew smiles guilelessly. “I’m a very clumsy swimmer.” Supplemented details and snippets of truth make the most convincing lies.

“Yeah? Maybe we should get some of that in stock, then,” the cashier sighs, her interest fading as she returns to her task of picking out dirt from under her fingernails. She doesn’t suspect a thing.

“That would be great,” replies Matthew, and he breezes out of the convenience store as light as the gentle wind teasing the edges of his contraband-laden coat, justifying his own thievery with the rationalization of necessity: he needs the supplies to tend to the wounds lacerating his torso. He hasn’t gone swimming for a week because of them, and it’s not like anyone else would care for him.

Of course, there’s really no need for justification, because he doesn’t feel regretful or doubting at all. He just likes to think of a good explanation in case he gets found out, that’s all. Matthew doesn’t see the point in feeling bad.

* * *

 

"The desire for material possessions drives man to do evil,” says Reverend Matthews, “You must pay your debts as soon as possible.”

“I swear I will, Father,” Matthew answers, without real intent to make up for anything.

“Good. Keep going,” the Reverend mutters, resigning himself to the fact that Matthew’s list of sins is likely a mile long, and whatever he confesses would only be a frugal fraction.

“I wished ill upon my ‘father’,” Matthew continues, mockingly stressing the last word.

* * *

 

Dinner is silent in the Demme household, as it often is. There are only two settings for supper with the Demmes: silent or explosive. It goes without saying that Matthew prefers it when things are quiet. He is running out of stolen Band Aids for the more boisterous nights.

Matthew watches his foster family dine on their quotidian meal with great interest, not touching his own food. Jonathan eats like a prisoner devouring his last meal before hanging, Mrs. Demme flits mawkishly around her plate, and Mr. Demme is as stoic as a monolith, reticent until he isn’t.

Picking up his dented fork, two of its four tines pushed together to form a single point, Matthew rearranges the food on his plate, shovelling all the undesirable items to one side and scooping the acceptable portions into his mouth. He chews slowly, his jaws working precisely to grind food into bits before he swallows. When Matthew finishes, he runs his tongue over his teeth to get rid of any remaining crumbs, and pushes his plate to the centre of the circle with a low scraping noise that draws the attention of Mr. Demme.

“I’m finished,” Matthew states flatly. He digs his heels into the scratched floor and stands up so that his chair is pushed backwards with an unpleasant creak of abused wood.

Mr. Demme puts down his own utensils, creating an intentionally audible clang. “No you’re not. Sit back down.”

“I’m not hungry,” Matthew says, still standing.

Mr. Demme’s jaw tightens, like the increased tension on a bowstring when an arrow is nocked. “Doesn’t matter. Eat.”

Matthew swears that he feels a twinge of pain in the fading finger-shaped bruises adorning his throat. As he stands untouched and partitioned, a crushing force surrounds his windpipe and two calloused thumbs jut from under his chin and force his head up, stroking the side of his jaw like a violent caress. Slowly, Matthew is squeezed into a thin-necked bottle until his lungs bubble like sparkling water so dazzling it scintillates carbonated flashes across his quivering vision, but he closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to see the peaked nose anymore and the moment passes. He can breathe freely again, and that floating, jagged, nose sits firmly above a set of thin lips four feet away, across a square table with burn marks etched into its surface.

Quickly regaining his bravado, Matthew’s unpleasant recollection is replaced with a surging, defiant hatred that lifts his chin, as if promulgating the dirty purple and blue painting his neck that had kept his collar flipped up for a week. “I’d really rather not.”

Mr. Demme balls his right hand into a fist, and Matthew hears it slam on the table before the silverware even rattles. “You’re going to eat the food _I_ put on this table, and you’re going to be damn _grateful_ for it!” The man seems to blaze with an unprecedented fury, his teeth full of glinting malice, lips drawn back in an animalistic snarl. “Now sit your ass down and eat, before I _stuff_ it down your throat.”

Reluctantly, Matthew takes his seat, never breaking eye contact with Mr. Demme. He doesn’t need to be an avid student of body language to tell that it’s better to just back down, but he sure as hell isn’t going to be happy about it. Still glaring and inwardly fuming, Matthew stabs at his food and deposits in his mouth with entirely more force than necessary. Several identifiable emotions pulse in his furiously working jaws and twitching bruises: anger, hatred, and an odd sort of jealousy.

If Matthew is being honest with himself, he would admit that he _envies_ Mr. Demme for his unquestionable power and domination of the household, the kind of control that Matthew can only dream of having. Later, before he goes to bed, he imagines strangling Mr. Demme with the same easeful, robust strength. He sleeps better that night than he has in weeks.

* * *

 

“At least,” says Reverend Matthews, sounding increasingly more disillusioned each time he speaks, “You did not give into the urge to-”

“I ate the food my mother set out for donation,” Matthew adds, almost smugly.

* * *

 

Various sized cans sit upon the kitchen counter, stacked in miniature spires and textured metal towers. The scene reminds Matthew of a walled-in city, a fortress stocking up for impending battle, with canned tuna watchtowers and bridges made from bags of cheap pasta stretching in between each structure, gates made of tinned sauces just creaking to a close as the kitchen light sun flicks off. It’s all Mrs. Demme’s handiwork, of course, annoyingly precise and brimming with stickling punctiliousness.

Every month without fail, Mrs. Demme stocks up on the cheapest non-perishable food items she can get her contorted hands on for donation to the Salvation Army, shopping more enthusiastically for these occasions than she does for her family, until the kitchen counter is laden with second-rate foodstuffs and non-expiring rejects.

The food that Mrs. Demme donates is rarely good quality, and always on sale, the kind of items that she would deem unfit to nourish her own son, but always bought in staggering quantities, more livestock feed than pabulum. The first time Matthew walked in on this practice, his jaw literally dropped open, because he had never seen such a large amount of food together outside of a store, not even at charity bins. The sumptuous magnitude of Mrs. Demme’s purchases is an excellent cover up for the low nutritional value of her purchases, and creates the preening impression that she is an incredibly generous person. Her reputation as a kind-hearted, self-effacing, magnanimous citizen and church-goer is a thousand times more important to Mrs. Demme than her foster child.

Matthew has been forced to sit through this process of attaining great amounts of food four times so far, and each time he has salivated over the heap while being forbidden to touch an isotope of it. Somehow, the verboten aspect of this nonpareil edible trove has only increased his appetite for it. The mountain of cans sways invitingly, tendrils of redolent temptation wafting off the gargantuan structure like the fruit and wine of tortured Tantalus.

When Matthew originally arrived at the Demme residence, he had been hopeful, like a naive idiot. Perhaps they wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe they would just leave him alone. He was wrong. The moment Matthew stepped into the house, Mrs. Demme decided that she hated him, and would become his most stagnant antagonist. Arguably, Mr. Demme’s cold fury, or Jonathan’s sick games are worse, but the sheer tenacity of Mrs. Demme’s acrimony makes her a fearsome contender for the top spot.

Like any good Catholic mother, Mrs. Demme embraces her church mandated feminine obligations, cooking dinner for her loved ones dutifully and without complaint. Her meals for Mr. Demme and Jonathan are exemplary, always wafting with piquant smells and dotingly stuffed to the crusted brink with scrumptiousness, its sapidity with the characteristic homeliness of an all-American suburban meal.

Unfortunately, Matthew does not make it onto the list of Mrs. Demme’s loved ones, and her contempt shines through her culinary creations. Every dish manages to be grotesque and unpalatable, the lowest rejects in a pile of trials, more like fresh sewage sludge than something that came out of a kitchen. There isn’t anything else to eat, so Matthew has trained his tastebuds to go numb during mealtimes, but the few instances he refused to choke down what Mrs. Demme gave him, he was ardently punished anyway. Matthew isn’t sure where the money from fostering him is going, but it certainly isn’t going towards food and sustenance.

Thus, Matthew’s original reaction to Mrs. Demme bringing home a truck’s worth of provisions during the first month of his stay was to filch some and just _run._ He sat on a kitchen stool, swinging his legs back and forth like a pendulum and watched Mrs. Demme bustle around the kitchen with the concentration of a hawk. A few boxes of no-name brand cereal stacked strategically proved useful in hiding him from view while maintaining a watchtower-like view on Mrs. Demme. As soon as she left the kitchen, (To nag someone? To go to the wash up for dinner? Matthew didn’t know, nor particularly care) Matthew leaped down from his perch and began dismantling the pile of food.

From alphabet soup to preserved zucchini, Mrs. Demme had it all. Matthew’s fingers almost shook as he sifted through each can, dizzy with the vast hoard splayed out in glorious resplendence before him. He ran his thumb along the jagged rim of a dented tin, tossing the cool weight between each hand. If Matthew closed his eyes, he imagined that he could tell the contents of the can without even reading the gummy, water-stained label. Soup made a sloshing noise when upended and was heavier than other cans of its size, beans and peas rattled slightly and had completely smooth sides opposed to the ridged edges of canned vegetables, and pasta felt glutinous and viscous when Matthew tipped the can back and forth. Eventually, he had selected a small, pyrite-coloured tin of canned peaches, the Panamanian gold of the picture on the label and sickly sweet aroma drawing him in like a magpie to a duchess’ forgotten silver.

Matthew clutched his prize as creeping vines would a traveller’s corpse, and rummaged around the cutlery drawer for a can opener. He found only some worn utensils and a dilapidated fruit peeler, and the drawer above it was no success either, yielding only an extra garage key and some surplus dishwashing tablets.

“What the _hell_ are you doing?!”

In a jolt of surprise, Matthew had dropped his precious can on the floor, along with the rusted can opener he found in the cabinet above the stove. He still remembers the accusing clang that it made as it hit, bouncing up in what seemed to be a slowed-down moment of finality, spinning on its rim until it skittered to a pathetic halt. The dent in the corner of the can felt like pure disappointment to Matthew.

Mrs. Demme had hit Matthew with the heel of her palm and snatched the can opener from his loosened grip. “You selfish little shit!” she spat, her face so close to Matthew’s that he could feel the heat from her waves of emanating anger. “How dare you fucking steal from not just me, but from the _needy_!” Mrs. Demme grabbed Matthew’s arm and twisted it painfully so that he could not escape.

 _As if you care about anything other than your precious reputation,_ Matthew had thought, but the lurching crackle of his arm being yanked in a way that did not suit its socket stopped him from saying the words out loud.

“You are absolutely _disgusting_ ,” Mrs. Demme hissed, stressing each syllable with enough force to make Matthew wince.

It was at this point that Matthew decided that he had had enough. He gritted his teeth together in what might have looked like a manic, haphazard grin to Mrs. Demme, and wrenched his arm out of her grasp, sending the woman stumbling forwards. His eyes welled up with liquid throbs of pain, which only served to obstruct him on his breakneck egress. He had slammed the screen door extra hard on his way out to drown the sound of Mrs. Demme’s screaming. Unkempt grass, loose pebbles and worn cement crunched under his bare feet, and he was fairly sure that he stepped on the flat side of a glass shard once or twice, but it felt so good to run away that Matthew found he simply _couldn’t_ stop.

A little after midnight, all the lights had flicked off in the Demme residence so that the crooked structure was illuminated only by the high moon in third quarter just passing overhead the master bedroom’s window. Matthew slunk in through the sliding glass door behind the house, and crept up the stairs with as much aching-footed stealth as he could muster.

As Matthew had slipped into his shared bedroom (quite literally, almost falling over at the fault of some unfolded laundry left on the smooth, wooden floor) an unexpected voice greeted him, making his heart plummet momentarily. To his great relief, it turned out just to be a mysteriously wakeful Jonathan, sitting up in bed and watching Matthew drop on his own mattress like a predator might consider some sort of unknown opposition.

“Thought you wouldn’t be back tonight,” Jonathan said.

Matthew shrugged.

“You left before dinner.”

He pressed his lips together, still not answering.

“You’re probably hungry.”

There was almost no light at all in the bedroom; the moon shone through the other side of the house.

Jonathan had smiled and reached under his pillow at this point, drawing out something wrapped in a paper sack. Matthew knew what it was before the older teenager even spoke. “I saved something for you.”

With the quicksilver speed of fish launching itself out of water, Matthew had leaped off of his bed and towards Jonathan, hand shooting out to grab at the sack. To his dismay, Jonathan snatched it away just as quickly as he had revealed it, and Matthew was left sprawling uselessly, his stomach making displeased noises.

Jonathan pushed Matthew off of his lap, and dangled the bag above the younger boy’s head teasingly. Even in complete darkness, the glint in his eyes was perceptibly _mirthful_. “If you wanna eat,” he said in a singsong voice, “You gotta pay up.”

Matthew worked his jaw in a circle, looking away as he considered his options. He wasn’t afraid of Jonathan like he was of Mr. Demme, or even wary towards, like he was with Mrs. Demme. Jonathan was an entirely different dilemma: a game of control that relied not on force, but reciprocal secrecy and the heart-crumbling shame of supposed choice and illusory free will. He exploited and manipulated as skilfully as a horny sixteen year old with sadistic tendencies was capable of (said capabilities are certified to be terrifyingly high), and Matthew hated giving into him like he hated going to church.

Eventually the pit chewing its way up his torso had won, and Matthew leaned forward on his knees, throwing aside the sheets twisted atop Jonathan’s legs, resolute in his decision like he ever had any choice at all. Jonathan, for his part, had enjoyed the experience greatly, moaning with enthuse and even twining a few fingers through his victim’s hair with what could only be described as a sort of perverted tenderness, the action seeded through with adoration and degradation, a portrait of decadence and ascension alike.

Matthew went to sleep that night with a full stomach and a bad taste in his mouth that spearmint and fluoride could not wash away. For the fleetest second as he lay in bed, listening to Jonathan breathe, he felt strange. Not regretful or guilty, just uneasy. He wondered if Mrs. Demme was right. Maybe he was disgusting. After that, Matthew didn’t want to be awake anymore.

Due to his unpleasant experience the first time around, Matthew has not attempted to steal food in any manner from the Demmes since. He has not _attempted_ a culinary theft, but he has certainly planned one. He’s just been waiting for the perfect moment.

 _And what if that moment is now?_ Matthew thinks, sitting on the same kitchen stool, pressing his lips together in consideration.

Mrs. Demme has been starving him for four days for swearing at her during an argument, and there is only so much food one can steal from the staff room before someone notices. With the pompous foolishness of a general after a single victory in battle, Mrs. Demme has left her hoard of so-called altruism unguarded during her trip to the supermarket to pile its peaks higher. Matthew is famished and the canned empire calls to him in a wonderfully tinny voice. Why should he abnegate himself any longer?

Matthew picks up a bag of dry spaghetti, smiling lopsidedly at the sound it makes when he lifts it, like rain drizzling against a flimsy window pane. The state of the needy is the last thing on his mind right now. He selects a tin of assorted vegetables, and picks up some canned tomato sauce, his conscience as free as a dove that has squeezed itself through the wire bars of its cage, with no self-doubt to impede him he has only time as an adversary.

Dropping his gathered provisions beside the stove, Matthew thinks that after the pasta he will finally get a taste of those canned nectarines. He cannot wait to taste their ambrosia.

* * *

Even with the lattice in place, Matthew is sure that the good Reverend’s eyebrows are knitted together like crochetwork for a sick nephew. “Stealing from the less fortunate is a grievous sin,” he says, still attempting to sound authoritative. “Go on.”

“I gave into sexual gratification,” Matthew replies, grinning at the audible uncomfortable shift that his answer produces.

* * *

 

The Demmes have gone on a family outing to the cinema without Matthew. He doesn’t feel that his exclusion is all too tragic. It’s quite convenient, really, given that he has particular reason to want to be alone.

Said reason sits in between Matthew’s legs and demands to be paid attention to, but a lingering illusion of facetious modesty makes him hesitate. He fingers the end of his worn belt, fastened to the tightest notch (but still not enough to keep his pants secure around his waist), its buckle covered in dents. A small, half-used jar of Vaseline sits at his bedside, the blue plastic top already invitingly off.

Matthew sighs, and kicks off his pants, deciding that he’d rather do it now than with Jonathan as a voyeur, cursing the only part of his body that seems to be caught up with the developments of nature. Of course, his newfound sexuality might be Jonathan’s fault, but Matthew doesn’t like to give his foster brother credit for anything.

Still fidgeting his lips, Matthew pulls off his boxer briefs, slightly nauseated by how his erection springs free so eagerly. Perhaps it’s self consciousness or years of Catholic upbringing, but Matthew has not yet mastered the masturbatory art. He looks away and covers his face with his hands in an effort to keep them away from his itching boner.

This is a fruitless endeavour, as his left hand finds its way to the Vaseline jar and promptly to his dick without a single thought. The action is so fluid and natural that Matthew is almost afraid of his own lust for a second, feeling a surge of hatred towards Jonathan for teaching him how to jack off.

Matthew gives his cock an experimental stroke and an unwitting groan burbles from his lips as a result. The warm feeling spreads from his groin to his belly, chipping away at his virgin reluctance. He rubs again, faster this time, drawing out a choked exhale deep in his throat. Matthew finds that there is a sort of unmatched satisfaction in debauching oneself, all lonesome joy and parsimonious consumption. He moans enthusiastically now, devoured whole as he is by pleasure.

It feels good. It feels _right_. Matthew’s qualms have all but dissolved into a melting vat of bodily sensation and flesh rapture. He strokes himself more rapidly, grazing his thumb across the head of his cock in carelessness, and practically doubling over from the sparks it sends to ever pleasure centre in his brain. Matthew feels as if he is in perfect harmony with his body, completely in control for the first time. He doesn’t need to imagine some erotic scenario or pretend that his hand is not his own, this act is not just physical satisfaction but a _sacrament_.

Matthew cries out in jubilation as he cums. Even as he reaches down to wipe up the mess with some tissues, the feeling resonates within him, a perpetual slow burn flickering around his still-thudding heart. He is suddenly free of shame or guilt, released by his revelry in revelation.

* * *

 

Reverend Matthews doesn’t even bother to make a comment on Matthew’s previous statement. “What other sins do you have to confess?” he says warily.

“I thought myself better than God,” Matthew answers.

* * *

Matthew swings his legs in boredom. All in all, it has been a fairly uneventful day, culminating in him sitting on top of a brick wall watching the sun set, an uncharacteristically peaceful activity for someone like Matthew.

He _did_ however run into Reverend Matthews while lurking in the library, whom upon sighting Matthew proceeded to spout a great deal of babble about faith and God.

Matthew scowls and drags his heel against abrasive bricks. He doesn’t understand why everyone is so hopped up about God. Once you get around to really _thinking_ about it, God is just an idea, a delusion shared by a billion devotees.

Who is God but a personification of what every mortal dreams to be?

All-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful. Matthew thinks that it’s awfully unfair that all this potency should be given to one entity, and none other than a vengeful charlatan playing dice with human lives. What kind of devil sits impassive to his creations, leaving a thousand prayers unanswered, punishing the innocent for nothing more than existing? Certainly not a God that Matthew would like to follow blindly into the hellish darkness.

If He does exist, He is certainly not the forgiving, merciful God of Sunday sermon. If God exists, He is as human as His foul children. Why else would there be such hells on Earth?

Matthew sneers. He doesn’t need that. He doesn’t need God, or faith, or religion, or any of it. He is _better_ than that.

With a crunch of gravel, Matthew jumps down from the brick wall and starts heading home, away from the drowning sun. Even with his contempt, he does wonder from time to time what it would be like to be God.

 _It doesn’t matter,_ he tells himself, padding along the sidewalk like all the time in the world belongs to him, _I don’t need to be God to decide fate._

* * *

 

Reverend Matthews is quiet for a moment. “There is no man who can be superior to God. He resides in heaven, above earth, for a reason.”

“I guess,” is Matthew’s only answer.

“Is there anything else?”

In the darkness of the confessional, Matthew moves his hand to his mouth to cover his smile from the eye of God. “I made my family late for church.”

Reverend Matthews sighs. “Indolence is one of the greatest downfalls of man, and only vigilance can protect him from sin. Is that all you have to confess?”

Matthew nods, then realizes that Reverend Matthews cannot see him and says, “Yes, that’s all.”

Reverend Matthews remains silent, as if waiting for Matthew to continue. He sighs disinterestedly and states in a flat tone of voice, “I am deeply sorry for these and all the sins of my past life.”

The priest clears his throat, clearly jilted by Matthew’s apparent spiritless attitude. “The most wise, righteous, and gracious God,” he quotes, “Doth sometime leave for a season his own children to manifold temptations and the corruption of their own hearts, to chastise them for their former sins, or to discover unto them the hidden strength of corruption and deceitfulness of their hearts, that they may be humbled; and to raise them to a more close and constant dependence for their support upon himself, and to make them more watchful against all future occasions of sin, and for sundry other just and holy ends.”

Matthew fidgets in boredom while Reverend Matthews assigns him penance, barely listening to the drifting words. When there is a lull in the priest’s commands, Matthew interjects quickly with an Act of Contrition, hoping to end the process as quickly as possible. “O God, I am truly sorry for having offended you and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven and the pains of hell, but most of all because I have slighted you, my God, who is good and deserving of all my love,” he says sarcastically, “I resolve, with the help of your grace, to confess my sins, to do penance and to amend my life.” He pauses and then adds an “amen” as an afterthought.

Reverend Matthews sighs loudly again. “The Lord forgives you,” he mutters reluctantly, “Give thanks to God, for He is good.”

“May His mercy endure forever,” Matthew finishes, like the edited together ends of two different tape recordings. He exits the confessional with a yawn, already forgetting his supposed sins.

 _What a useless guilt trip_ , Matthew thinks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let's play a fun game called can you spot all the references and which event corresponds to which deadly sin
> 
> also, again: i am so sorry


End file.
